• Open

    US seeks standards dominance, lets Huawei access previously forbidden crypto tech
    Beijing thinks standards should include central network controls. Washington does not The US Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) has relaxed restrictions that barred export of some encryption technologies to Huawei, in the name of ensuring the United States is in a better position to negotiate global standards.…  ( 4 min )
    NASA just weeks away from trying again with SLS Moon rocket launch
    Will it be third time lucky? NASA will attempt, for the third time now, to blast off its Space Launch System (SLS) rocket to the Moon in late September.…  ( 4 min )
    Mozilla CSO demands fines to curb Big Tech surveillance
    These super-corps are otherwise enjoying 'a consequence-free zone' Mozilla's Chief Security Officer Marshall Erwin urged federal regulators to crack down on internet giants and web browser makers that don't protect their users' privacy — and to make them pay penalties for bad behavior.…  ( 6 min )
    Intel, Broadcom show off interoperable Wi-Fi 7 kit
    For those who reckon we'll make it out of 2022 alive and into 2024 Intel and Broadcom have demonstrated cross-vendor interoperability of Wi-Fi 7 kit, claiming over-the-air speeds of more than 5Gbps between an Intel-based laptop and a Broadcom Wi-Fi 7 access point.…  ( 5 min )
    Dump these small-biz routers, says Cisco, because we won't patch their flawed VPN
    Nothing like an authentication bypass for your private IPSec network Cisco patched three security vulnerabilities in its products this week, and said it will leave unpatched a VPN-hijacking flaw that affects four small business routers.…  ( 6 min )
    Mandiant ‘highly confident’ foreign cyberspies will target US midterm elections
    It is with a heavy heart that we must announce that the hackers are at it again Mandiant is "highly confident" that foreign cyberspies will target US election infrastructure, organizations, and individuals in the run-up to the November midterm elections.…  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Atomic Heart försenas till i vinter
    Vilket kan innebära både 2022 och 2023.  ( 6 min )
    EA avtäcker studion Ridgeline Games, med Halo-veteranen Marcus Lehto
    Och som bekant ska den syssla med Battlefield-kampanjer.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Intel Acquires The Team Behind ArrayFire GPU Acceleration / Parallel Computing Software
    In addition to Intel acquiring Linutronix as the company known for their work on the real-time (RT) kernel patches and other contributions and then back in June acquiring Codeplay Software, Intel has today made another notable software talent acquisition... Intel announced this afternoon that the team behind ArrayFire has joined the company to further their ambitious software endeavors...  ( 6 min )
    Intel Details More Arc Graphics A-Series Hardware Specifications
    Intel has detailed more of the Arc Graphics A-Series hardware specifications for upcoming models, including the A700 series...  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Feds claw back $30 million of cryptocurrency stolen by North Korean hackers
    Blockchain analysis keeps getting better. Expect more seizures to come.  ( 5 min )
    The knives are out again in first teaser for Glass Onion
    "Lock the doors. Stay in your rooms. Everyone is in danger."  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Intel Reveals Specifications For Arc Alchemist Desktop GPUs
    Almost everything you wanted to know about Arc Alchemist desktop GPUs, except actual performance numbers, is here.  ( 63 min )

  • Open

    From “stop the spread” to “you do you”: NY mask policy has experts facepalming
    The messaging is seen as a "low point" in public health messaging.  ( 6 min )
    GirlsDoPorn founder, on the run for 3 years, now on FBI’s Ten Most Wanted list
    $100K reward for Michael Pratt, who was charged with sex trafficking in 2019.  ( 5 min )
    Cloudflare explains why Kiwi Farms was its most dangerous customer ever
    Cloudflare wants government to be responsible for blocking sites like Kiwi Farms.  ( 6 min )
    Bridgestone has put more than $100M into eco-tires made of shrubs
    Drought-friendly plant can produce rubber good enough for Indy race tires.  ( 6 min )
    Apple updates its AppleCare+ support service to offer unlimited repairs
    The subscription service formerly only let you pay for two repairs per year.  ( 5 min )
    The cheap Chromecast is rumored to also upgrade to Google TV
    It sounds like Google's 4-year-old 1080p streamer is getting a full OS and remote.  ( 5 min )
    Judge slams Musk for withholding text messages, cites “glaring” omissions
    Judge also chides Musk for wasting time, says there's no time for "just kiddings."  ( 5 min )
    With Koe Recast, you can change your voice as easily as your clothing
    New AI tool alters the style and timbre of your voice, concealing your vocal identity.  ( 6 min )
    William Gibson’s novel comes to vivid life in first teaser for The Peripheral
    Prime Video series is the latest from Westworld creators Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy.  ( 6 min )
    What do you get when you combine an iPad and an e-bike?
    The Urtopia Carbon is a decent bike that tries to do a lot with its software.  ( 6 min )
    Jeep will launch four all-electric SUVs in the US by 2025
    First up are the all-new Jeep Recon and the Jeep Wagoneer S.  ( 5 min )
    Ukraine is under attack by hacking tools repurposed from Conti cybercrime group
    Researchers from Google and IBM see unprecedented blurring of lines.  ( 5 min )
    Hands-on with the Apple Watch Ultra and AirPods Pro
    Plus glimpses of the updated Apple Watch SE and Apple Watch Series 8.  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Some PCIe 5.0 SSDs Confined to 10 GBps; Others Hit 12.4 GBps
    The lack of fast 3D NAND chips limits the performance of SSDs with a PCIe 5.0 x4 interface.  ( 60 min )
    Intel Arc Alchemist: Release Date, Specs, Everything We Know
    Intel's Arc Alchemist will be the company's first 'true' dedicated graphics card in over two decades, sporting a new architecture and vastly improved features and performance for Intel GPUs. Here's everything we know.  ( 89 min )
    Best Cheap CPUs of 2022, Tested and Ranked
    You can get a surprisingly powerful processor for less than $60. We've tested several cheap CPUs to help you find the right one for your needs and budget.  ( 70 min )
    Corsair Vengeance RGB DDR5-6000 C36 Review: Performance and RGB Aesthetics
    Corsair has refreshed its Vengeance lineup with new speedy DDR5 memory kits. Can they outpace the current competition?  ( 67 min )
    AMD FidelityFX Super Resolution V2.1 Improves Ghosting, Temporal Stability
    AMD keeps providing the goods with its open-source alternative to NVIDIA's DLSS, heating up the supersampling tech wars.  ( 63 min )
    Cooler Master Launches New 120mm Fans That Promise To Reduce Unwanted Vibrations
    Cooler Master is releasing new 120mm ARGB and non-RGB fans that promises to provide good performance while featuring smooth and quiet operation.  ( 60 min )
    Radxa Lifts Lid on Eight-core Compute Module To Take On Raspberry Pi
    Radxa’s new board is CM4 compatible but has more powerful specs.  ( 63 min )
    Best Power Supplies 2022
    Here are the best power supplies for gaming PCs. These PSUs offer the best reliability, performance and protection for your PC components.  ( 74 min )
    Seagate Partners With DNA Tech Startup for 1000x Data Densities
    Seagate's prototype machine is the size of a family kitchen, but using ‘lab on a chip’ technology it is hoped to shrink the device size down to seven liters.  ( 60 min )
    EVGA SuperNOVA 850 G7 Power Supply Review
    EVGA is back at top performance with the SuperNOVA 850 G7.  ( 70 min )
    Acer’s 35-Inch Z35P Gaming Monitor Drops $100 Below Previous Low: Real Deals
    The massive 35-inch ultrawide Acer Predator Z35P curved gaming has had $100 knocked off of its previous lowest price and is now only $399 on Amazon.  ( 66 min )
    Best Wireless Gaming Headsets 2022: Bluetooth, Budget, and More
    From Bluetooth connectivity to premium leather comfort, here are the best wireless headsets for gamers, creators, and professionals alike.  ( 75 min )
    Best Wireless Mouse 2022: Premium Productivity Mice
    Looking for the best mouse for the office? These are our top picks for wireless productivity.  ( 80 min )
    Leaked Raptor Lake Specs Show More Cores, Higher Power Draw
    Leaked slides with confidential Raptor Lake information reveal detailed specs for Intel's first wave of Raptor Lake CPUs.  ( 60 min )
    Best Password Managers 2022: Free and Paid
    A good password manager is secure, seamless, and syncs across all of the platforms you use.  ( 78 min )
    Best Gaming Chairs 2022
    We rank the best gaming chairs from budget seats to big and tall thrones.  ( 75 min )
    Best Gaming Microphones for 2022
    Whether you're chatting with teammates or streaming on Twitch, these are the best gaming microphones to buy in 2022.  ( 76 min )
    Nvidia RTX 40 Series Debut Expected at Sept 20 GeForce Beyond Event
    Press invites arrived a few hours after a mysterious teaser emerged. The special event will begin at 8am PT on the day, and be followed by the Nvidia CEO’s keynote speech.  ( 59 min )
    Best Budget 4K Monitors 2022
    We tested a room full of screens to find the best budget 4K monitors, including 32-inch, curved and gaming options.  ( 73 min )
    Monoprice Joule Review: Cheap 3D Printer, No New Ideas
    The Monoprice Joule is an Ender style clone at a bargain price.  ( 64 min )
    Best PC Gaming Headsets 2022: Budget, Wired and Wireless
    From budget to wireless, we've tested the best gaming headsets, and these are our picks for 2022.  ( 79 min )
    Best Resin 3D Printers in 2022
    We help you find the best resin 3D printers for beginners, under $300 and more.  ( 72 min )
    Best SSD and Hard Drive Deals 2022
    These are the best SSD and HDD deals — guaranteed to expand the storage on your PC without emptying your wallet.  ( 65 min )
    Intel Expects Continued Market Share Loss Throughout 2023, Will Likely Exit More Businesses
    Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger spoke at the Evercore ISI TMT conference, revealing that he expects the company to continue losing data center market share until 2024.  ( 60 min )
    Ryzen 7 7700X Edges Past Core i9-12900K In New Benchmark
    AMD's forthcoming Ryzen 7 7700X shows up in new single-and multi-threaded benchmarks.  ( 63 min )
  • Open

    Battlefield's next campaign being developed by Halo co-creator's new studio
    In an announcement today, general manager of the Battlefield series Byron Beede announced that Ridgeline Games, the new EA studio led by Halo co-creator Marcus Lehto, is developing the next singleplayer campaign in the series. Beede also wrote that they are "all-in on Battlefield", with DICE continuing to work on Battlefield multiplayer and a third studio, Ripple Effect, "creating an entirely new Battlefield experience." Read more  ( 16 min )
    Steam has launched new hub pages to make browsing genres and tags easier
    The Steam store has been updated to introduce revised hub pages for tags, genres, theme and category pages. The changes include clearer personal recommendations, easier access to subcategories, and further options for searching and filtering. The changes come after months of testing as one of Valve's Steam Labs experiments. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory now has new official dedicated servers
    I somehow missed that Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory came to Steam back in April, 19 years after it was first released. Now Bethesda have announced that they're launching new dedicated servers for the free World War 2 shooter, which will all run the six original maps with no mods. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Eidos Montreal is "now the owner" of Deus Ex and Thief games, but don't get too excited
    Eidos Montreal, the studio behind recent Thief and Deus Ex games, say they are "now the owner of the games [we] developed, like the Deus Ex and Thief games." Likewise, Crystal Dynamics say they have taken "control" of its Tomb Raider and Legacy Of Kain games from their previous owner, Square Enix. Which sounds like a big deal, but really both studios are just reporting a change to their terms of service and privacy notices since they were bought by Embracer Group last month. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Rally Point: Phoenix Point's final form still frustrates as much as it innovates
    Do you ever feel like you're sitting down with a game like a worried parent, saying "I just don't know what to do with you?" Because that's how I feel about Phoenix Point after the last few months of playing it on and off. I’ve definitely enjoyed it more than on its release in 2019, and its DLC adds more to think about and manage during what were once long lull periods. There's a lot to like about its final form. There's also a lot to... I don't quite want to say hate, but I'm also not quite sure why. It's one of the most evenly mixed bags I've ever rummaged around in. Read more  ( 21 min )
    AMD launch FSR 2.1 for sharper GPU upscaling
    FSR 2.0 – AMD’s graphics card-powered upscaling tech for boosting games performance – already has a newer, prettier version. AMD have announced FSR 2.1, which is available to developers immediately, and has made its playable debut via a Farming Simulator 22 update – just a couple of days after FSR 2.0 got its latest big-name backing from Red Dead Redemption 2. Read more  ( 16 min )
    EVE: Online’s Uprising expansion changes up factional warfare in November
    Space-based alternate reality EVE: Online is getting another expansion focusing on factional warfare this November, devs CCP Games have announced. Uprising promises to move the ongoing story of EVE forwards, along with improvements such as new ships, balance changes to old ships, logos on your ships, and a whole bunch of other stuff to do with ships. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Awesome Games Done Quick 2023 is staying digital because Florida
    Speedrun charity fest organisers Games Done Quick have revealed the dates for winter’s Awesome Games Done Quick event, and noted that it’ll once again be held online rather than in-person. They’ll be bringing the speedruns from January 8th to 15th this time around. AGDQ 2023 had originally been planned to take place in Florida, but that’s scrapped due to the state’s attitudes towards COVID-19 and LGBTQ+ people. Read more  ( 17 min )
    The Electronic Wireless Show podcast episode 201: the best cinematics in games
    We enter the new pod-century on the Electronic Wireless Show podcast a man down, as Matthew won't be here for a few weeks. Not to worry, though, as myself and Nate are ever ready to hold down the fort. This week we're talking about our favourite cinematics in video games, a fitting subject because last weekend I saw the greatest piece of cinema yet conceived by man: Michael Flatley's Blackbird. I do spend quite a lot of time explaining Blackbird to Nate, but after that we do talk about some cutscenes and cinematics in games (as well as litigating the difference between the two, and Nate tries to remember the first time he saw a cutscene in a game that was in-engine rather than being pre-rendered). And today the Cavern Of Lies is a Cavern Of Justice, after we received a troubling missive from one [squints] Brond Coatwear? Read more  ( 17 min )
    5 weird games out in September that I might not have time to review but really want to
    I saw a panel of thriller authors a couple of months back and one of them made reference to "the fat chapter", and the others all went "Ohhhh, yes, the fat chapter!". Thriller writers deal in short, snappy chapters, and the fat chapter is the one that ends up getting a load of events or exposition shoved into it, somewhere in the second half, because they wouldn't fit anywhere else. Every year in games there's a fat month, where loads of games come out and loads of them look really good and there is never enough time godammit. This year that month is September. There are so many games out this month that look so much my jam that I want to spread 'em on my morning toast, but September is also the month that a lot of RPS staff have holiday booked - including me, for two weeks, which means that if these games do get reviewed it probably won't be by me. But know that I have my beady little eyes on 'em. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Football Manager 2023 scores a PC and Game Pass release date of November 8th
    Football Manager 2023 starts its career on November 8th, publishers Sega have announced today, and it’s also coming to Game Pass on launch day alongside its regular PC release. Put on your warmest big coat and take a glance at the stats-heavy trailer below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Temtem review: a Pokemon-like that listens to what fans want
    Temtem’s inspiration has always been clear. We didn’t beat around the bush when it entered early access back in 2020 - Cian Maher called it the best Pokemon game in years - and I won’t beat around the bush now. It’s still the best Pokemon game in years. It borrows so much from Nintendo's behemoth, but it also takes some much-needed lessons that Game Freak fails to recognise, taking the formula to its highest evolution yet. Read more  ( 21 min )
    Temtem devs address its premium battle pass controversy
    Monster-taming MMO Temtem just launched out of early access on PC earlier this week, but developers Crema have taken to Discord to defend the game’s paid battle pass. Some players have been getting themselves very worked up over the inclusion of a paid pass in a full-priced game. Yet there’s been a plan to include a battle pass in Temtem for years. Check out the game’s launch trailer below while you wrap your head around it all. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Jack Move review: a bite-sized JRPG that blends Neuromancer with Final Fantasy VII
    It cannot be a coincidence that 1997 is a pivotal year in the world of Jack Move. In the game, it's the year everything went dark in this turn-based Japanese-style RPG, with a solar storm biffing the world's electronics. It threw the world into chaos, giving rise to the megacorps that now control the dystopian cyberpunk society where our heroine Noa is trying to make a living. In the real world, of course, 1997 was the year Final Fantasy VII came out, the seminal JRPG that Jack Move owes a great deal to (right down to its menu plink plink sound). Developers So Romantic have said outright that it's been one of the main inspirations for Jack Move, and its shady corporate powers and grungy urban landscape certainly feel of a piece with ShinRa's grip on the city of Midgar. But the bigwigs at MonoMind aren't out to poison the world and suck the life from it in Jack Move. Instead, they're more concerned with using their newfound technological powers to find eternal life – a classic 'upload your mind to the metaverse' kind of tale you'll probably recognise if you've read any of the cyberpunk 101 novels such as William Gibson's Neuromancer or Permutation City by Greg Egan. Jack Move's story doesn't tread any new ground in this respect, but Noa and her hacker pal Ryder are a fiery spirited pair that make this six-hour tale of espionage and rebellion against its cartoonish villain well worth dipping into. Yes, you read that correctly. A JRPG you can polish off in a single day of play. Bliss. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Bring a little light this month with charming adventure game The Spirit And The Mouse
    Indie team Alblune, which consists of developers Lucie Lessuyer and Alexandre Stroukoff, have a release date for their cute new game The Spirit And The Mouse, a narrative-focussed adventure game with some platforming thrown in. In order to save the cosy town of Sainte-et-Claire, a charming mouse called Lila and a soft spirit called Lumion join forces to restore the town and its people. They'll be teaming up on Steam later this month on September 26th. Check out the trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Roadwarden review: a beautifully written visit to a mystery-filled peninsula
    I keep thinking about Roadwarden like a tourist city that I visited for not quite long enough. Sure, I saw the main sights and had a great time soaking in the ambiance, but I know that I missed so many hidden gems. I want to go back and explore, maybe this time with a local guide who knows its secrets. At its most basic, Roadwarden is a text-based RPG. You play as the titular roadwarden, who sets out from the city to investigate an unmapped peninsula with little more than their horse for company. Your goal as set by the people who sent you is to investigate the region and report your findings in preparation for the expansion of trade guilds in the area. But you can also set your own goal, shaping your character’s approach from the start in a way that helps with roleplaying a particular kind of adventurer throughout. And once you get to that adventuring, dozens of sidequests open up covering everything from gathering fruit to curing the plague. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Beast Breaker devs are closing due to lack of funding, along with their historic workers union
    Vodeo Games, the first game development studio in North America to unionise, are shutting down. The team behind turn-based RPG Beast Breaker announced their closure on Twitter, after being unable to find financial backers for another project. Beast Breaker wasn’t a game I was familiar with but its little mouse protagonist looks charming, as you can see in the trailer below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Skyrim mod adds hidden keys to find for all those locked chests
    Every corner of Skyrim houses a locked chest, but where are all the keys? Only a handful actually have keys to open them. So do the chest's owners lockpick them every time they want an apple or knife? Are these chests merely decorative, their contents deemed inaccessible and long forgotten? A new mod for Skyrim Special Edition answers this playfully by adding a load of hidden keys to unlock these chests. Some of the keys look quite well hidden in this object hunt, so you'll need to poke around, rummage, and turn things over. Read more  ( 16 min )
    A Plague Tale: Requiem has dialled up the rat horror, but shows restraint in its approach to violence
    When we last saw Amicia and Hugo de Rune at the end of A Plague Tale: Innocence back in 2019, things were looking up for the orphaned rat wranglers. They'd escaped the clutches of the French Inquisition and the hordes of plague rats following in their wake, and the pair were hopeful about finding a cure for the cursed macula flowing through Hugo's veins. Alas, when I pick up their journey in chapter six of Asobo's upcoming sequel, A Plague Tale: Requiem, Amicia is having a particularly terrible time of it. Not only is she suffering from an open head wound, leaving her unsteady on her feet, but rumours are flying in the nearby pilgrim camp about something bad having gone down in the last city they passed through. Exactly what is hard to say with five chapters' worth of context missing from my preview build, but the pack of guards who are hot on the siblings' trail quickly make it plain: several men died back in that city, and they're pointing the finger squarely at Amicia's knife, slingshot and crossbow. Read more  ( 22 min )
    £48 is a ludicrously low price for Razer's flagship wireless mouse
    Razer's Viper Ultimate is one of my all-time favourite gaming mice - and now it's a massive 72% off at Amazon UK. That brings it to £48, an incredible deal for an ultralight mouse with optical switches, an ambidextrous design and HyperSpeed wireless. You even get a free wireless charging dock with it - what's not to like? Read more  ( 16 min )
    Get $660 of 2K games - Borderlands, XCOM, Civ - for $16
    Humble Bundle remains an excellent place to pick up video game collections at rock-bottom prices, and today's 2K Megahits bundle is a doozy. It contains $660 worth of games from the publisher, including series like Borderlands, XCOM, Civilization and Bioshock, for $16 (or the equivalent in your local currency, this is a local sale). That's a reasonable price for even one of these games, let alone the 18 games included in this bundle. Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    Amy Hennig's new Marvel game rumoured to star Captain America and Black Panther in WW2
    Ahead of its official unveiling at tomorrow's Disney & Marvel Games Showcase, new rumours have emerged surrounding Skydance Media and Amy Hennig's upcoming Marvel title. Announced last October, few official details have so-far been shared on the project beyond the fact it'll be a "narrative-driven, blockbuster action-adventure" set in the Marvel universe. However, Marvel rumour collator MCU Status is now reporting that Hennig's game takes place during World War 2, and will see Captain America and Black Panther taking on the forces of Hydra. Eurogamer understands this to be correct. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Microsoft is currently testing new Xbox homepage "experiments" for launch in 2023
    Microsoft has detailed the first in a series of Xbox homepage "experiments" it's currently testing for possible launch in 2023, with the new features starting to roll out for a random subset of Xbox Insiders this week. "We know the Xbox homepage is where our gamers spend a lot of their time, and it's a space that's very personal," senior product manager lead Ivy Krislov explained in a new Xbox Wire post. "We also know we can always be listening and learning how we can do better here while keeping your experience fast and familiar." To that end, Microsoft is this week launching what it calls a "multi-month series of experiments to learn how to create a more personalised home screen experience and address some of the top trends and fan requests." Read more  ( 15 min )
    Battlefield creative director Lars Gustavsson leaving DICE after 22 years
    Lars Gustavsson, creative director on the Battlefield series, is leaving its developer DICE after more than 20 years at the studio. News of Gustavsson's departure from Battlefield, DICE, and indeed EA as a whole, was announced by Battlefield general manager Byron Beede in a blog post detailing the future of the long-running first-person shooter series. "Lars Gustavsson, who has been with the franchise since the beginning and is affectionately known as Mr Battlefield, has decided he is ready for a new adventure," Beede wrote. "Lars has dedicated a substantial portion of his life to Battlefield and is proud to have helped shape the franchise into what it is today. He is excited to pass the baton to the next generation of Battlefield creators at DICE, Ripple Effect, Industrial Toys, and Ridgeline Games." Read more  ( 16 min )
    The NieR: Automata secret church is now open to the public
    The NieR: Automata secret church that had players puzzled back in July is now available as a mod. Fans originally thought the new area was a long-hidden secret, but now it's accessible by downloading The NieR Automata Church mod on NexusMods. "Hello, i'm new to reddit and want to know how to open the church in Nier'Automata," reads the description, in a cheeky nod to the mod's humble beginnings as a confusing reddit post. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Crystal Dynamics now has "control" of Tomb Raider following Square Enix sale
    Following Square Enix's sale of its Western studios to Embracer earlier this year, Crystal Dynamics now has "control" of Tomb Raider and Legacy of Kain. The company shared the news in a short press release headlined "Crystal Dynamics takes control of its most beloved games". "We are excited to inform you that Crystal Dynamics has taken control of several game franchises - including Tomb Raider and Legacy of Kain - from the games' previous owner, Square Enix Limited," the PR reads. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Sony lawsuit claimant's reddit Ask Me Anything backfired
    The lead claimant of the recently filed anti-competition lawsuit against Sony hosted an Ask Me Anything Q&A on reddit yesterday. A couple of weeks ago it emerged that the case had been filed with the Competition Appeal Tribunal, alleging that Sony abuses its position in the market to unfairly charge customers. Leading the lawsuit is Alex Neill, who took to reddit to field questions about the case. It went about as well as you would expect - not at all. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Football Manager 2023 confirmed for PS5 after two-year no-show
    Football Manager 2023 is set for release on 8th November and this year will arrive on PlayStation 5, as well as Apple Arcade for the first time. On PS5, the game has been tailored for the Dualsense controller, while on mobile the Touch series returns to Apple devices via Apple Arcade after a year's absence. In addition, the game will be added to Xbox Game Pass on both PC and console from day one. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Nearly a decade of video with Eurogamer's Ian Higton
    It's been nearly 10 years since my guest today started working at Eurogamer. And when they began, their mission was simple: make YouTube happen. We had barely an audience there at the time. Oh, we'd tried video - you might remember Johnny Minkley and Eurogamer TV - but we missed the YouTube wave. So along came Ian Higton, my guest today, to make it right. He didn't solve YouTube alone or overnight of course - to do that he would need a team and time. But it was his tireless work, largely alone for two years, that laid the foundation for what was to come. And his continued work has helped shape Eurogamer on YouTube into the channel it is today: a popular and welcoming place Ian is super proud of. Listen to him talk about it in the podcast - it's lovely. I didn't realise how long he'd worked in TV beforehand, though. I knew Ian had worked for a shopping channel, which is brilliant, but I didn't realise he was there for 10 years! He even rose quite high up. And he once dressed as Skeletor to covertly appear on camera for a Halloween special, and it was recorded so you can watch it too. That's the cheeky Ian we know! Read more  ( 14 min )
    Xbox Game Pass is the closest thing we have to old school rentals, Tunic developer says
    The creator of adorable fox-themed action-adventure game Tunic says the offerings of Xbox Game Pass are the closest thing we have to the old school rental shops of days gone by. Speaking to TrueTrophies (via TrueAchievements), Andrew Shouldice praised Microsoft's subscription service, on which Tunic released, calling it an "incredible deal" for developers. "I think the thing that I liked most about it, that I didn't think about at the time, is the experience of going to - in Canada - to rent a game," Shouldice elaborated. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Soul Hackers 2: Atlus' new Persona-lite has major tech problems
    What's the longest you've ever waited for a video game sequel? Devil Summoner: Soul Hackers was released all the way back in 1997 on the Sega Saturn, a first-person dungeon crawler JRPG made by developer Atlus. Four console generations later we finally have a sequel - Soul Hackers 2 - though it's really a standalone game with mostly thematic connections to the original. 25 years is a long time in computer graphics, and Soul Hackers 2 has a wide variety of tech it could potentially use - but early footage didn't exactly impress. There's little here to suggest that the current wave of consoles are being taxed by this Persona-lite release - and the knock-on effect of that seems to be that the last-gen machines get some shocking ports, especially the vanilla Xbox One. Soul Hackers 2 borrows its gameplay elements from other recent Atlus titles, so at a basic level, it's a turn-based RPG oriented around exploiting weaknesses, which is an enjoyable enough system but nothing out-of-the ordinary for RPG veterans. There are some twists, like an overkill-style mechanic that rewards strategic play, and plenty of customization. But this isn't especially novel. Elsewhere, however, this game really shines. Soul Hackers 2 is a party-oriented title that weaves multiple characters through a winding, serialised story. Interpersonal conflicts and interactions take center stage here, and a social system gamifies out-of-combat interactions, giving simple conversations actual consequences. It's more like a TV show than a movie, with a 'villain of the week'-style narrative that features multiple short story arcs that build over time. This formula is fairly novel by industry standards but if you've played other recent Atlus RPGs - particularly Persona 5 or Tokyo Mirage Sessions - you'll know what to expect. That fortunately extends to the rest of the package as well, with a keen sense of visual style. But you can't make a video game out of artistic flourishes alone - so how does the 3D rendering hold up? Read more  ( 20 min )
    Sony reveals new grey camouflage PlayStation 5 collection
    A new collection of PlayStation 5 accessories will be hitting the market soon. These are all part of the grey camouflage collection, which Sony says will "bring a fresh unique aesthetic into play". The collection consists of the DualSense controller, the Pulse 3D wireless headset, and console covers for the PlayStation 5. Here is a little preview for the collection for you to enjoy. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Cyberpunk 2077's Roach Race is out on mobile now
    Roach Race, the mobile port of Cyberpunk 2077's in-game arcade game, is out now on mobile for free. The game was announced during the Edgerunners Special livestream earlier this week, where details of the upcoming expansion Phantom Liberty were revealed. The livestream also included information on the Edgerunners update, which added the aforementioned arcade cabinet to the game. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Awesome Games Done Quick 2023 goes online only after Florida deemed unsafe for community
    2023's Awesome Games Done Quick event, which will see expert players from around the world highlight their skills by beating games as quickly as possible, will be held virtually between 8th January and 15th January next year. This event was initially planned to be an in-person event, however, the organiser has made the decision to move it to an online-only affair, as it feels Florida is unsafe for its community at this time. Following the event's announcement yesterday, the Awesome Games Done Quickly team shared the following statement: Read more  ( 16 min )
    Minecraft - a new generation discovers the Forever Game
    Every time my daughter tells me about Minecraft's 1.19 update, she describes it in completely different terms. Thrilled: "One thing 1.19 introduced is these little animals, Allays, and if you give them an item they'll go and find more of them!" Frantic: "There's a new new boss called the Warden and it's the very first blind Minecraft mob. It can't see you. It only does stuff by hearing so that's why you always want to bring a sack of wool when you're trying to find one." Strangely frank: "I think a lot of people think Minecraft swamps are boring. 1.19 tries to change that." My Minecraft expert is nine years old, and she's an expert in Minecraft in the way that only a nine-year-old can be an expert in a game. Minecraft is a ready metaphor for everything in her life, but she's also deeply engaged in the minutiae of it. She has no fear of its depths and complexities. I went through a period of thinking it was sort of sad that she didn't draw in the evenings as much any more or play with her doll's house, but now I realise: she still does this stuff. She just sometimes does it in Minecraft, and it's all evolved and started to flow together: drawing, playing, landscape and imagination. Let's go back a bit. Like a lot of kids, ours has three or four games that come in and out of favour as the weeks pass. Minecraft, though, is the game that all the others orbit - it's always in the number one spot. In many ways it's the game she measures all other games by. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Bethesda launches official servers for 2003's Wolfenstein Enemy Territory
    Bethesda has announced it is hosting dedicated servers for Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory. Splash Damage's Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory first released in 2003 and was recently made available for free on Steam. Now, almost 20 years after it came out, Bethesda has deployed new servers dedicated to the online multiplayer shooter. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Amazon's Lord of the Rings MMO canned because "it just got very complicated"
    Amazon was set to release a free-to-play MMO based on Tolkien's Lord the Rings works sometime this year. However, in April 2021, the project was cancelled, with reports claiming a dispute with mega-games company Tencent was the catalyst for this decision. Now, speaking to GameSpot, Amazon Games president Christoph Hartmann confirmed this was indeed the case. "We had a deal with a Hong Kong-based company, Leyou; I think it would have been great to work with them. But they later got sold to Tencent and it just got very complicated," Hartmann explained. Read more  ( 16 min )
    A Plague Tale: Requiem is as stunning as it is stressful
    I'd forgotten how stressful A Plague Tale can be. These kids really don't get a break do they? It's probably not right to even call them kids any more either - I'm not sure how old Amicia is now, in Requiem, the sequel, but she's a young woman in attitude alone. She's been through some stuff, they both have - Amicia and her younger brother Hugo - and they've been shaped by it. And whereas they largely ran from trouble in Innocence, and all of their abilities were based around escaping, more or less, now they've got some fight in them. They're killers, and that changes things a bit, but I'll come to that. The stress: it's a good and bad thing. Part of it is absolutely intended, I believe. Developer Asobo wants us to feel the relentlessness of the challenge Amicia and Hugo face in staying alive. They're still mercilessly hunted by a shady organisation with a never ending supply of soldiers, and they're still very much at danger from the plague ravaging the land: The Black Death and the hordes of rats that carry it. Their existence is one escape from death after another. My goodness, by the end of the few chapters of Requiem I play, Amicia is a walking wreck, carrying a concussion that's made her collapse more than once. But she slogs on because she has to - I really like Amicia (both the character and the way she's acted and brought to life); I'm less keen on Hugo. The point is, they don't get a moment to relax so nor should you. And that's fine, but when the game is frustrating to play, problems arise. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Phasmophobia gets reworked Asylum map, custom difficulty on 27th September
    Just days after releasing an updated early access roadmap for Phasmophobia, developer Kinetic Games has announced the ghost hunting sim's next big patch - known as the Apocalypse Update - will be arriving on 27th September. There's a lot going on in Phasmophobia's Apocalypse Update, starting with the arrival of the new Sunny Meadows Mental Institution map - an entirely reworked, more visually interesting, and, crucially, more compact version of the game's previously released Asylum map. A recent poll suggested smaller maps were high on the list of players' wants, and - intentionally or otherwise - the Apocalypse Update seems to be delivering on that front. Not only is a smaller Sunny Meadows variant known as 'Restricted' included - offering "5 small maps in 1" - it also adds Camp Woodwind, a miniature variant of the Maple Lodge Campsite map. Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    Google urges open source community to fuzz test code
    We'll even get our checkbook out, web giant says Google's open source security team says OSS-Fuzz, its community fuzzing service, has helped fix more than 8,000 security vulnerabilities and 26,000 other bugs in open source projects since its 2016 debut.…  ( 5 min )
    Microsoft offers SQL Server 2022 release candidate to Linux world
    Redmond loves open source so much, it keeps most of its stuff closed Just weeks after rolling out SQL Server 2022 Release Candidate 0 for Windows, Microsoft is following with a release candidate for Linux systems.…  ( 5 min )
    Microsoft unveils SQL Server release candidate for Linux
    Remond modernizes database management system for an open and cloudy world Just weeks after rolling out SQL Server 2022 Release Candidate 0 for Windows, Microsoft is following with a release candidate for Linux systems.…  ( 5 min )
    Rest in peace, Queen Elizabeth II – Britain's first high-tech monarch
    HME2 signs off Obit  Queen Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor has died, ending the reign of Britain's longest-serving monarch. She was 96.…  ( 5 min )
    South Korea takes massive step toward sustainable nuclear fusion reactions
    Plasma at over 100 million kelvin for 20 seconds adds to list of noteworthy fusion breakthroughs in 2022 Scientists in Korea have succeeded in sustaining a plasma gas at 100 million kelvin for up to 20 seconds without significant instabilities, a feat thought to be a significant step forward in the quest for a sustainable nuclear fusion reaction.…  ( 5 min )
    Amazon CEO says company will slow hiring rate, no hard return to office planned
    Anyone fancy renting some office space? Amazon CEO Andy Jassy says the parent firm of the world's largest cloud service provider will likely slow the rate at which it's hiring staff, while noting he has no plans to force current workers to return to the office.…  ( 5 min )
    US state of Virginia has more datacenter capacity than Europe or China
    Welcome to Datacenter Alley, where you'll find the backbones of Microsoft, Facebook, Google, ByteDance... The state of Virginia has over a third of America's hyperscale datacenter capacity, and this amounts to more than the entire capacity of China or the whole of Europe, highlighting just how much infrastructure is concentrated along the so-called Datacenter Alley.…  ( 5 min )
    NASA picks a tailor for Artemis moonwalking suits
    After the events of the weekend, there's no need to rush Ever the optimist, NASA has handed Axiom Space a $228.5 million deal to develop a moonwalking system in the first award under a competitive spacesuits contract.…  ( 4 min )
    Google tightens screw on staff expenses as economy slows
    Will somebody think of the poor shareholders? They have kids too Google is joining the legions of other tech companies that are tightening up on company expenses in preparation for a potentially bumpier ride ahead in the global economy.…  ( 5 min )
    NTT Docomo claims first 5G network with both sub-6 GHz and mmWave
    Handsets with Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 platform should be able to take full advantage Japanese telco NTT Docomo claims to have the world's first commercial 5G Standalone (SA) network that enables smartphones to simultaneously use both mid-band (sub-6 GHz) and mmWave frequencies, known as 5G NR Dual Connectivity.…  ( 4 min )
    Private equity suits at Thoma Bravo pull out of Darktrace acquisition
    'Enterprise immune system' sees share price slump US private equity investor Thoma Bravo has pulled out of its planned takeover of Darktrace, causing shares in the UK cybersecurity company to plummet.…  ( 5 min )
    Lazarus Group unleashed a MagicRAT to spy on energy providers
    Cisco finds custom malware in North Korea's latest cyberespionage effort The North Korean state-sponsored crime ring Lazarus Group is behind a new cyberespionage campaign with the goal to steal data and trade secrets from energy providers across the US, Canada and Japan, according to Cisco Talos.…  ( 5 min )
    Ad blockers struggle under Chrome's new rules
    As deadline for mandatory code rewrite approaches, Manifest v3 still looks like a step backward Analysis  In January next year, Chrome browser extensions – such as ad blockers and other privacy tools – will stop working if they are reliant on an API called Manifest v2 (MV2).…  ( 6 min )
    Halfords slapped on wrist for breaching email marketing laws
    Bike and car accessory slinger fined £30,000 for hitting send on more than 499k unsolicited emails Bike and car accessory retailer Halfords has found itself in the wrong lane with Britain’s data watchdog for sending hundreds of thousands of unsolicited marketing emails to members of the public.…  ( 4 min )
    Open source biz sick of FOSS community exploitation overhauls software rights
    Lightbend's Akka shifts from Apache 2.0 license to BSL 1.1 – but critics not pleased about pricing Lightbend is fed up with commercial entities using its open source wares in production environments and giving nothing back to the FOSS community, so is making an alteration to the licensing of a popular product.…  ( 5 min )
    Hype versus reality: What you can't do with DeepMind's AlphaFold in drug discovery
    Protein prediction it can do, the next steps not so much – not that it was trained for this Analysis  DeepMind's AlphaFold model has predicted nearly all known protein structures discovered yet, though its ability to help scientists discover new drugs remains unproven.…  ( 6 min )
    Hype versus reality: What you can't do with DeepMind's AlphaFold in drug discovery
    Protein predication it can do, the next steps not so much – not that it was trained for this Analysis  DeepMind's AlphaFold model has predicted nearly all known protein structures discovered yet, though its ability to help scientists discover new drugs remains unproven.…  ( 6 min )
    Analyst Forrester rates virtual machine infrastructure ‘stale or risky’
    So are ITSM tools that can’t spread, data tools, and private 5G. But outsourcing is cool again Analyst firm Forrester Research has published its 2023 planning guide for Technology Architecture and Delivery and warned that IT departments will face increased spending scrutiny as economic conditions tighten.…  ( 3 min )
    Asus packs 12-core Intel i7 into a Raspberry Pi-sized board
    Or if you're looking for something lower power, it can be had with a pentacore Celeron If you’ve ever thought to yourself these single board computers (SBC) could use a few more cores, Asus’ Aaeon latest system might be right up your alley.…  ( 4 min )
    DoJ charges pair over China-linked attempt to build semi-autonomous crypto haven on nuked Pacific Atoll
    Yes, that’s a lot to digest: the core of it is an allegation that Marshall Islands legislators were bribed to make it possible About halfway between The Philippines and Hawaii is a place called Rongelap Atoll that’s infamous for having been unintentionally irradiated after 1954 nuclear weapons test conducted by the USA at nearby Bikini Atoll.…  ( 5 min )
    Regulators approve Citrix/Tibco merger
    Odd couple will tie the knot in late September – but there's still no sign what's in store Citrix has announced that its planned de-listing and merger with Tibco has cleared regulatory hurdles and the two companies will therefore become one during the last week of September 2022.…  ( 4 min )
    Apple Silicon takes a back seat at iPhone-heavy launch event
    We guess new chips are only for Pros At this week’s big iPhone launch, Apple's custom Arm-compatible chips – known as Apple Silicon – received little fanfare compared to what the processors have enjoyed at previous events.…  ( 6 min )
    Judge tells Elon Musk he can't stall Twitter trial
    Tech billionaire can tap into Mudge whistleblower complaint, though A judge has turned down Elon Musk's request to delay his trial with Twitter.…  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Ny Gotham Knights om serietidningsinfluenser och familjekänsla
    Glimtar bortom action-bitarna.  ( 6 min )
    CD Projekt: new-gen-releasen av The Witcher 3 kommer släppas i år
    Är "på god väg".  ( 6 min )
    Nu har Crystal Dynamics och Eidos Montréal officiellt tagit över Tomb Raider och Deus Ex
    Square Enix inte längre ansvariga.  ( 6 min )
    Sonic Frontiers
    I open world-Sonic tar blådåren en ny riktning. FZ:s första intryck är blandade.  ( 7 min )
    CD Projekt bedyrar "fullt engagemang" i Cyberpunk-ip:t bortom expansionen
    Har beslutat att bara göra en expansion.  ( 6 min )
    Lira Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory som förr - officiella servrar är igång igen
    Vanilla-versionen.  ( 6 min )
    Basmodell av Xbox Elite 2-kontrollen avtäckt - avskalad och 700 kr billigare
    För dig som klarar dig utan extra spakar och väska.  ( 7 min )
    Quake är nu spelbart (läs: "spelbart") på Apple Watch
    Nästan 60 fps ändå!  ( 6 min )
    Quiz – Vad kan du om Battlefield?
    20 år har gått sedan Battlefield 1942. FZ firar med ett jubileumsquiz.  ( 6 min )
    Storrea - 16 euro för Mafia-remaken, Xcom x2, Borderlands 3, Civ 6, Bioshock x3...
    Humble Bundle kränger 2K-spel för en spottstyver.  ( 6 min )
    Expansionen Together We Rule har utannonserats till Humankind
    Diplomati och spionage utlovas.  ( 6 min )
    Stadsbyggaren The Wandering Village lufsar in i early access
    Bygg en by på en gigantisk varelse.  ( 7 min )
    Läcka bekräftar Assassin's Creed Mirage till last-gen
    Och annan info om spelet.  ( 7 min )
    CD Projekt Red bekräftar att nästa Witcher-spel är starten på en serie
    Och första spelet befinner sig fortfarande i förproduktion.  ( 7 min )
    Playstation: Xbox har erbjudit oss tre år av Call of Duty
    Och enligt Jim Ryan är det inte alls tillräckligt.  ( 7 min )
  • Open

    Classic racer Re-Volt returned to Steam — here's how to work it on Steam Deck / Linux
    Re-Volt is a retro delight originally from the year 1999, that originally came to Steam in 2013. Sadly it was pulled from Steam when it was found to contain code written by the community, that the Steam release did not have permission to use. Now it's back.  ( 4 min )
    AMD announces FidelityFX Super Resolution 2.1 upgrade
    AMD continue pushing ahead with improvements to their upscaling tech FidelityFX Super Resolution with version 2.1 already available now.  ( 4 min )
    Proton Experimental fixes up Red Dead Redemption 2, gets more games working
    Recently Red Dead Redemption 2 had a big update which amongst other things, added in FidelityX Super Resolution (FSR) 2.0. Sadly, it broke it on Linux and Steam Deck but Valve already have a fix out but you need to pick it manually for now.  ( 4 min )
    Counter-Strike: Global Offensive improves startup time, Steam Deck Steam Input improvement
    Valve has put out an update for Counter-Strike: Global Offensive that not only makes it startup faster but improves Steam Input handling on Steam Deck too.  ( 4 min )
    Paper Animal RPG takes inspiration from Paper Mario and Pokémon Mystery Dungeon
    Paper Animal RPG is a rather cute looking upcoming game. Currently in development from Cuddling Raccoons Studio it's a mixture of exploration, dungeon crawling, combat and a little relaxation by the campfire too.  ( 4 min )
    The Excavation of Hob's Barrow releases September 28th
    The Excavation of Hob's Barrow is an upcoming folk horror narrative-driven point and click adventure, with a really great mixture of animated pixel-art and Native Linux support.  ( 4 min )
    NVIDIA are teasing something, likely their RTX 40 series GPUs
    Seems we're due the next-gen lot of GPUs from NVIDIA soon, as they've begun their teaser campaign for something big.  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    New EA studio to develop narrative campaign set in the Battlefield universe
    Today, Electronic Arts announced a new studio, Seattle-based Ridgeline Games, tasked with developing a narrative campaign taking place in the Battlefield universe. Led by Halo co-creator Marcus Lehto and composed of industry veterans from around the world, the studio is "excited to tell stories and take players on incredible adventures that are only possible within the Battlefield universe." "It is a great honor to have the opportunity to collaborate with DICE and Ripple Effect and lead the charge on expanding the narrative, storytelling, and character development opportunities in the Battlefield series,” said Lehto, game director and head of Ridgeline Games. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Football Manager 2023 out November 8, and it's coming to PlayStation 5 and Apple Arcade
    Football Manager 2023 has been given a November 8 release date, and word comes from SEGA that it will be available across a breadth of platforms and devices. This includes PlayStation 5 and Apple Arcade for the first time. On PS5, it will be "tailored" to the Dualsense controller, and after a year’s absence, the Touch series returns to Apple devices through the Apple Arcade platform. “FM23 marks another significant step forward for the Football Manager series as we debut on two new platforms," said Miles Jacobson, Sports Interactive’s studio director. "Fans have been calling for us to produce a PlayStation title for a number of years, so I’m excited for those players to now get the chance to experience the closest thing to being a real football manager." Read more  ( 16 min )
    Amazon's Lord Of The Rings: The Rings of Power is great, but the games need to reach PS2-era brilliance again
    It’s been over 20 years since we first set off from The Shire with Frodo and Sam on their quest to destroy the Ring of Power, and despite a series of lacklustre Hobbit films doing their best to extinguish it, the passion still burns hot as the fires of Mount Doom for that quintessential trilogy of fantasy epics. In the times before and since those releases, with the exception of Tolkien’s other literary works, fans have relied heavily on video game interpretations to continue their direct relationship with the characters, settings, and stories of Middle-earth and the One Ring. But, after a series of spin-offs and non-canon additions slowly boiling the purity of the IP down to directionless mediocrity, it’s critical that future iterations endeavour to recapture the familiarity and emotion that comes with being part of something that you believe in before it’s even begun. That’s right — I’m talking about movie tie-ins. Look, you might scoff, and I wouldn’t blame you for doing so considering tie-in history, but Electronic Arts mastered this in the early noughties with their direct film-to-game releases of The Two Towers and The Return of the King, and it’s about time that we reached for the same dizzying heights of success. A lot of the complication revolves around licensing, and we don’t want to get too bogged down in that. But to summarise, The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit, and the rest of Tolkien’s works fall under an extremely complex network of rights that gives even Goldeneye a run for its money. But the fundamentals can be worked out when it comes to game development. The Tolkien Estate, at one time, held all the rights to all of Tolkien’s works. Over time, these rights have changed hands and have been split into different sections, ultimately resulting in Lord Of The Rings and The Hobbit falling under one banner, whilst the rest of his works (such as The Silmarillion and The Unfinished Tales) fall under another. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Xbox asking Insiders to "help shape" the new Xbox Home Experience
    Microsoft is changing up the UI on Xbox consoles and wants user input on the layout, design, and ease of access changes. Starting this week, a random subset of Xbox Insiders in the Alpha Skip-Ahead ring will see some of these changes as the Xbox team experiments with different approaches. In addition, the team is exploring options for new game channels and collections when you scroll down. This will include content curated for you based on the games you’ve played or how to make the most out of your Game Pass subscription. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The Dreamcast lives on with a new ‘next-gen’ iteration of its iconic VMU memory card
    Sega may have long since left console manufacturing behind, but the Dreamcast remains one of the longest-lived games consoles going, with fans ever so occasionally putting out new Dreamcast releases. The system has a cult following - the Dreamcast never dies. The latest new development in Dreamcast technology is now available to be backed on crowd-funding site Indiegogo - and it’s a curious upgrade to one of the system’s most unique features - its VMU memory cards. For those of you who aren’t rapidly hurtling towards their forties or indeed already there, the VMU (Visual Memory Unit) was a fascinating take on the memory cards of the time, making them interactive and fun rather than simply a slab of plastic that held your save data. Original VMUs contained a little LCD screen that could display information from the game you’re currently playing - providing a very rudimentary two-screen experience years before the Nintendo DS would do the same with far more utility. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Build a city perched on a moving colossus when The Wandering Village hits Early Access next week
    The Wandering Village, a city-building sim where you manage a village perched on a giant beast's back, will go into early access next week. Developed by Sweden-based Stray Fawn Studio, the game takes place in a world where mysterious, toxic plants are spreading. You will need to lead a small group of survivors as they seek shelter on the back of a giant beast they call Onbu. You will need to help the villagers build a functioning settlement and form a relationship with Onbu to survive the hostile world. As you expand the village over Onbu’s back, you will need to utilize the limited space as efficiently as possible. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Division: Heartland details are out in the wild thanks to a now-deleted store page
    The next game in The Division series may have had its details released early, thanks to the Ubisoft store page for the game being set live prematurely. While the website has since been hastily taken down, a handful of eagle-eyed people on the internet managed to catch if before it vanished, and published the info online. One such person, Unknown1Z1 on Twitter, recorded the page in full prior to its removal. In it, we can see several features we can expect to come to the game, as well as a basic description of what it’ll actually be. The Division: Heartland will be a “free-to-play survival-action multiplayer shooter” according to the store listing. Set in middle America, the game will have a PvEvP mission type called Storm Operations, which has 45 players take part in a battle against “A group of dangerous rogue agents, an aggressive faction known as The Vultures, all while surviving a lethal virus”. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Death Stranding inspired Cryptobiosis plushies will be available at Tokyo Game Show
    In a photoshoot fit for Vogue, Hideo Kojima has shared some snaps to Twitter of him posing with some new Cryptobiosis plushies that’ll be available at Tokyo Game Show later this month. Details have not yet been revealed regarding the price of the plushies, or whether they’ll be available online during and after Tokyo Game Show. What we do know, however, is that they’re quite charming, even if they are strange, small life forms used for replenishing blood. Going off the photos that Kojima shared, it appears the plushies will be available in two sizes. One of them being small enough to prop up on a shelf or cuddle to sleep, while the other is large enough to make the perfect cushion, as Kojima exhibits. The plushies are also shown off beside a Danboard figurine for size reference! Read more  ( 16 min )
    PlayStation hits out at "inadequate" Call of Duty offer from Xbox
    Despite Microsoft's intent to continue making Call of Duty available on PlayStation platforms beyond the current deal with Activision, Sony says the offer is "inadequate on many levels." The offer was made privately between the two companies, but PlayStation CEO Jim Ryan made his feelings on the matter known after Xbox head Phil Spencer discussed it publically. This is the latest in a cascade of events following Microsoft's decision to acquire Activision Blizzard for $69 billion, which is currently pending regulator approvals. In a statement to GamesIndustry.biz, Ryan explained that Microsoft's offer does not consider the impact on PlayStation players. Microsoft's assurances, which Spencer made public in a comment to The Verge earlier this month, reference a written commitment in January that promised Call of Duty would remain on PlayStation "for at least several more years beyond the current Sony contract." Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    Blender 3.3 CPU-Based Performance Looking Nice For AMD & Intel
    With yesterday's release of Blender 3.3 much of the excitement has been about the new Intel oneAPI back-end for Arc Graphics acceleration and also improvements to AMD's HIP back-end for supporting GPUs back to Vega. However, even if you are using CPU-based rendering, Blender 3.3 LTS is looking like a nice upgrade for better performance...  ( 5 min )
    AMD Releases FidelityFX Super Resolution FSR 2.1
    AMD's GPUOpen group has released an updated version of FidelityFX Super Resolution 2. The new FSR 2.1 brings quality enhancements and a reduction in artifacts as the primary benefits over the original FSR2 that was unvelied earlier this year and open-sourced during the summer...  ( 4 min )
    AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D - Windows 11 vs. Ubuntu 22.04 LTS Linux Benchmarks
    With the AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D as the first consumer processor with AMD 3D V-Cache technology that launched earlier this year, the Linux performance has been fantastic for a variety of workloads especially in areas of technical computing and other non-gaming workloads -- similar to the great results we've enjoyed with AMD EPYC Milan-X processors too. One of the areas I hadn't had a chance to look at until recently was how the Windows 11 vs. Linux performance is looking for this Ryzen CPU with its 96MB L3 cache. Here are those quick benchmarks.  ( 4 min )
    Distrobox 1.4 Released - Easier Container Upgrades, Local Podman Install For Steam Deck
    Distrobox is the open-source software that quickly and easily fires up Linux distributions in containers for helping to augment the package selection from your host distribution, easily experiment with different distributions, and other use-cases. Distrobox 1.4 is out this week with the latest enhancements for this project...  ( 5 min )
    Vulkan 1.3.227 Adds Legacy Dithering Extension To Help OpenGL On Vulkan
    Last week saw the debut of Vulkan 1.3.226 with mesh shader support introduced as a new cross-vendor extension while out this morning is Vulkan 1.3.227 with a new extension for helping the layering of OpenGL atop Vulkan...  ( 4 min )
    Qt 5.15.6 LTS Open-Source Version Released
    One day shy of a year since Qt 5.15.6 LTS Commercial was released, The Qt Company has now published that point release as open-source...  ( 5 min )
    Fedora 38 Looks To Accelerate GnuTLS With Kernel TLS
    With Fedora 37 approaching release at the end of October, more feature changes for Fedora 38 next spring are continuing to be discussed. One of the interesting proposals this week is enabling acceleration of GnuTLS using the kernel TLS (kTLS)...  ( 5 min )
    LLVM Clang 16 Defaulting To C++17 As The Default Standard
    While LLVM 15.0 was just released this week with many new compiler features, a big change just merged for next spring's LLVM/Clang 16.0 release: C++17 with GNU extensions is now the default C++ and ObjectiveC++ version...  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Quiz: Är du smartare än en göteborgare?
    Folket som gästade Meet & Geek GBG fick en rejäl utmaning i quizform och vinnarlaget kammade hem segern med blygsamma 4 poäng. Anta utmaningen och visa att du är bättre än göteborgarna!  ( 5 min )
    Nvidia haussar Geforce RTX 4000-serien på Twitter
    Med evenemanget GTC nära förestående bjuder Nvidia datorentusiaster till specialsändningen "Project Beyond" med mystisk teaser.  ( 5 min )
    Microsoft släpper billigare Elite-kontroll
    Microsofts Elite-kontroll erbjuds nu i mer avskalad variant där endast de väsentliga tillbehören skickas med.  ( 5 min )
    Geforce RTX 4090 dyker upp i renderingar
    Rykteskvarnen maler vidare och nu letar sig en smygtitt på en riktig mastodont ur den kommande grafikkortsserien ut på Twitter.  ( 6 min )
    Playstation 5 med omdanat inre är energisnålare
    Den nya revisionen av Playstation 5 har ett mindre moderkort och förändrad kylning, något som ser ut att ge ett lägre effektuttag.  ( 6 min )
    AMD ändrar namnschemat för framtidens mobila processorer
    Bolaget vill bland annat göra det tydligare att se vilken arkitektur som används i en specifik processor genom att endast titta på modellnamnet.  ( 6 min )
    Apple lanserar klocktrio med äventyrsmodell i spetsen
    Under sitt septemberevenemang uppdateras Apple Watch-uppställningen med Series 8, ny generation budgetvänliga SE-modeller och Watch Ultra för extremsportaren.  ( 8 min )
  • Open

    Untitled
    here’s the link!!  ( 2 min )
  • Open

    Antoine Beaupré: Complaint about Canada's phone cartel
    I have just filed a complaint with the CRTC about my phone provider's outrageous fees. This is a copy of the complaint. I am traveling to Europe, specifically to Ireland, for a 6 days for a work meeting. I thought I could use my phone there. So I looked at my phone provider's services in Europe, and found the "Fido roaming" services: https://www.fido.ca/mobility/roaming The fees, at the time of writing, at fifteen (15!) dollars PER DAY to get access to my regular phone service (not unlimited!!). If I do not use that "roaming" service, the fees are: 2$/min 0.75$/text 10$/20MB That is absolutely outrageous. Any random phone plan in Europe will be cheaper than this, by at least one order of magnitude. Just to take any example: https://www.tescomobile.ie/sim-only-plans.aspx Those fine folks …  ( 2 min )
    Thorsten Alteholz: My Debian Activities in August 2022
    FTP master This month I accepted 375 and rejected 25 packages. The overall number of packages that got accepted was 386. I also had a closer look at the RM-bugs. All in all I addressed about 90 of them and either simply removed the package or added a moreinfo tag. In total I spent 13 hours for this task. Anyway, if you want to have your RM-bug processed in a timely manner, please have a look at the removal page and check whether the created dak command is really what you wanted. It would also help if you check the reverse dependencies and write a comment whether they are important or can be ignored or also file a new bug for them. Each removal must have one bug! Debian LTS This was my ninety-eighth month that I did some work for the Debian LTS initiative, started by Raphael Hertzog at Free…  ( 3 min )
  • Open

    Komikku: A Free and Open-Source Manga Reader for Linux
    Kommiku is a feature-rich manga reader available exclusively for Linux. Try it out!  ( 23 min )

  • Open

    Here’s a first look at the iPhone 14 and iPhone 14 Pro
    The iPhone 14 looks the same, but the 14 Pro offers an alternative to the notch.  ( 6 min )
    Juul settles massive nationwide probe into youth vaping for $438.5M
    The once dominant e-cig company faces yet more legal challenges and FDA scrutiny.  ( 6 min )
    Today’s best deals: Google Pixel 6, MacBook Pros, Apple AirPods Max, and more
    Dealmaster includes MacBook Pros, Google Nest Hubs, Apple Watches, and more.  ( 8 min )
    Apple Watch Series 3, dead in all but name, now actually dead
    Gone, but probably not too soon: Apple's weirdly old, slightly discounted Watch.  ( 5 min )
    Sony calls Microsoft’s 3-year Call of Duty sharing offer “inadequate”
    PlayStation CEO says Microsoft "undermines the principle" of cross-platform access.  ( 6 min )
    There’s no iPhone 14 mini, but the iPhone 13 mini lives to fight another day
    Persistent reports of poor sales mean small-screened phones are vanishingly rare.  ( 5 min )
    Google Maps can now pick the most efficient route for EVs
    Previously, Google Maps' "efficient" routes were only for gas vehicles.  ( 5 min )
    Scientists glean new insights into how tardigrades can survive dehydration
    Proteins form gel-like filaments that stiffen into networks to support dried-out cells.  ( 7 min )
    New wave of data-destroying ransomware attacks hits QNAP NAS devices
    DeadBolt has already infected thousands of QNAP storage devices this year.  ( 5 min )
    Leaked Oath Keepers’ list includes hundreds of cops, dozens of elected officials
    Interactive map makes it easier to track security threats from state to state.  ( 6 min )
    iOS 16 launches September 12
    New iPhone software will bring lock screen changes, passkeys, and app updates.  ( 5 min )
    iPhone 14 Pro and iPhone 14 Pro Max ditch the notch—sort of
    Bigger cameras and a notch-less design headline Apple's flagships.  ( 6 min )
    Apple’s iPhone 14 gets a Plus size, improved cameras; starts at $799
    There's not much new here compared to 2021, to be honest.  ( 6 min )
    Second-generation AirPods Pro use new H2 chip, enhanced noise cancellation and spatial audio features
    Apple's in-ear headphones get their first update since their 2019 debut.  ( 5 min )
    Apple Watch Ultra launches on September 23, starting at $799
    Brightest Apple Watch display yet, plus aerospace titanium case, built-in cellular.  ( 5 min )
    New Apple Watches unveiled with focus on health and safety
    Lineup includes Apple Watch Ultra, Apple Watch Series 8, and Apple Watch SE.  ( 5 min )
    AMD is making laptop CPU model numbers simultaneously less and more confusing
    Numbers will accommodate a range of new CPUs that sometimes use older Zen cores.  ( 6 min )
    Musk cited possible “World War III” as reason to break Twitter deal, text shows
    After hearing, judge rejects Musk request to delay Twitter trial by four weeks.  ( 6 min )
    Developer creates delightful programming font based on Minecraft
    "The font for developers who like Minecraft a bit too much."  ( 5 min )
    Surgeons performed a successful amputation 31,000 years ago in Borneo
    The skeleton of an individual known as Tebo 1 dates to around 31,000 years old.  ( 6 min )
    Efforts to ID Tulsa race massacre victims raise privacy issues
    Project uses genealogy website that can be accessed by law enforcement.  ( 6 min )
    Are Hawaii’s beach showers in violation of the Clean Water Act?
    Showers likely a “point source” of sunscreen contamination and a threat to coral reefs.  ( 6 min )
    Splatoon 3 review: Nintendo’s well of squid ink has run dry
    Nintendo's "coolest" series has run out of fresh ideas, both online and off.  ( 6 min )
    With BA.5 boosters, Biden officials herald the start of annual COVID shots
    Officials hope booster uptake will at least match seasonal flu shot coverage.  ( 6 min )
    What we learned driving VW’s new electric ID Buzz
    We've tested a European-spec Buzz, but the US models have to wait until 2024.  ( 7 min )
  • Open

    Apple debuts iPhone 14, Watch 8, other sparkly things
    With Crash Detection (no, not that kind) and satellite-powered SOS when cell service is absent Apple on Wednesday enticed favored members of the media and its ever-enthusiastic employees from Cupertino to hear word of the company's iPhone 14, Apple Watch 8, and second generation AirPods Pro earbuds.…  ( 6 min )
    Microsoft warns of bugs after nation pushes back DST switchover
    Some of the hardest things in programming: Handling times and dates The decision last month by Chilean leaders to delay a switch to Daylight Savings Time (DST) by a week could cause headaches for some Windows users if they don't implement the workaround outlined by Microsoft.…  ( 5 min )
    Amazon expands end-to-end video encryption to battery-powered Ring devices
    Whether this works as advertised is key Ring's battery-powered video-doorbells-slash-surveillance cameras can finally turn on end-to-end encryption (E2EE).…  ( 4 min )
    AMD admits its Ryzen mobile naming scheme is a mess, promises to clean it up
    Finding Zen just got a little easier AMD is changing the way it names mobile processors to make it more obvious whether you’re getting their freshest Zen cores or last year’s leftovers.…  ( 5 min )
    US school year opens with reading, writing, and ransomware
    FBI warns that Vice Society threat group is ramping up attacks on the education sector The Vice Society threat group is ramping up ransomware attacks on US school districts just as students around the country return to the classroom, the FBI and other federal agencies are warning.…  ( 6 min )
    Australian quantum startup enlists GlobalFoundries to develop mass qubit production
    Company claims tech can detect quantum information at room temperature A semiconductor company called Archer Materials says it is working with chip manufacturer GlobalFoundries to help it develop high-volume production quantum processor technology.…  ( 4 min )
    Scientists pull hydrogen from thin air in promising clean energy move
    Could replace fossil fuels in several energy-hungry industries in hot climates without water use Scientists have produced hydrogen from thin air, a development they say could help industry harvest the promising eco-fuel in the most arid environments.…  ( 4 min )
    Google CEO Pichai: We need to up productivity by a fifth
    Ideas include restructuring key goals and expunging needless meetings Google execs are embarking on a company-wide efficiency drive to make the digital advertising and cloud computing business 20 percent more productive.…  ( 4 min )
    Mandiant links APT42 to Iranian 'terrorist org'
    'It's hard to imagine a more dangerous scenario,' Mandiant Intel VP told The Reg Mandiant has named a new threat group, APT42, that it says functions as the cyberspy arm of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), which has plotted to murder US citizens including former National Security Advisor John Bolton.…  ( 5 min )
    Taking CHIPS Act cash? You're banned from planting advanced fabs on Chinese soil
    Rules apply for next decade, warns Commerce Department, which can claw back cash US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo has warned that the US Commerce Department "has the ability to claw back money" if recipients of CHIPS Act semiconductor manufacturing grants "compromise national security" by developing leading-edge tech in China in the next decade.…  ( 6 min )
    Taking CHIPS Act cash? You're banned from planting advanced fabs on Chinese soil
    Rules apply for next decade, warns Commerce Department, which can claw back cash US Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo has warned that the US Commerce Department "has the ability to claw back money" if recipients of CHIPS Act semiconductor manufacturing grants "compromise national security" by developing leading-edge tech in China in the next decade.…  ( 5 min )
    Cybercriminals target games popular with kids to distribute malware
    Kaspersky research finds Minecraft and Roblox have the most malicious files associated with them With 3 billion players globally, the $200 billion gaming market is an increasingly ripe target for cybercriminals – with the perennially popular Minecraft one of the most targeted lures.…  ( 5 min )
    Qualcomm targets mid-range and volume smartphones with fresh Snapdragon SoCs
    Both platforms based on Kyro semi-custom Arm CPUs Qualcomm has unveiled fresh smartphone platforms in its widely used Snapdragon mobile line that target the mid-range and mass-volume segments respectively.…  ( 4 min )
    OVHcloud opens up Bring Your Own IP service for IPv4 failover
    Anyone planning to migrate to IPv6 then? Bueller? French cloud provider OVHcloud has opened up a Bring Your Own IP service, which it said allows customers to reuse existing public IPv4 blocks as failover addresses in the event of an outage.…  ( 4 min )
    Computational storage specs hit v1.0 after 4 years of work
    Emerging field now has baseline definitions for vendors to work with The Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA) has at last published version 1.0 of its Computational Storage Architecture and Programming Model, the specs meant to help develop the new performance-boosting tech by providing interoperability between different vendors.…  ( 5 min )
    UK tech sector facing structural difficulties, says analyst firm
    Meanwhile, Federal Reserve sentiment sees US tech stock fall amid uncertainty While US tech stocks have suffered in response to rising inflation, interest rates and general economic uncertainty, the UK tech sector — or what is left of it — is doing worse.…  ( 5 min )
    Japan's NTT claims it's built 1.2Tbit/s optical comms that sip power
    Cloud and 5G mean the world needs beefier backbones and NTT thinks this could build them Japan's NTT Corporation claims it has developed technologies that allow data transmission at 1.2Tbit/s per wavelength in an optical system.…  ( 4 min )
    The answer to 3D printing equipment on Mars might lie in the Red Planet's dust
    Talk about dirt cheap Scientists claim they have fed a strong titanium alloy and a sprinkling of simulated Martian regolith into a 3D printer to study how future astronauts may one day be able to print tools and rocket parts in space.…  ( 5 min )
    CERN draws up shutdown plans to save energy
    Particle accelerators could be next casualty of Russia's war on Ukraine CERN, the European Center for Nuclear Research, is preparing to idle some of its particle accelerators to save electricity, currently in short supply due to the war in Ukraine.…  ( 5 min )
    As Cybersecurity Week begins, Beijing claims US attacked Uni doing military research
    National Security Agency apparently has tools that crack Solaris boxes China has accused the United States of a savage cyber attack on a university famed for conducting aerospace research and linked to China's military.…  ( 5 min )
    Pakistan government labels its own cybersecurity team 'incompetent'
    MP alleges taxpayer database – which holds personal info on millions – has come under attack A Pakistani parliamentary committee has labelled its own cybersecurity agency "incompetent".…  ( 4 min )
    SiFive RISC-V CPU cores to power NASA's next spaceflight computer
    After more than two decades, the space agency's PowerPC love affair appears to be at an end Chip designer SiFive said Tuesday its RISC-V-compatible CPU cores will power NASA’s just-announced High-Performance Spaceflight Computer (HPSC).…  ( 5 min )
    Go programming language arrives at security warnings that are useful
    Low-noise tool hopes to highlight vulnerabilities imported into projects The open source Go programming language, developed by Google, has added support for vulnerability management in a way designed to preserve programmers' patience.…  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    PlayStation boss calls Microsoft's post-acquisition Call of Duty offer "inadequate on many levels"
    PlayStation boss Jim Ryan has spoken out against Microsoft's offer to keep Call of Duty on PlayStation for "at least several more years" beyond Sony's existing agreement with publisher Activision Blizzard, calling the deal "inadequate on many levels" - despite Microsoft's insistence it went "well beyond typical gaming industry agreements". It's the latest shot fired in an increasingly public back and forth between the two companies as governmental scrutiny of Microsoft's proposed $69bn USD acquisition of Activision Blizzard grows, particularly in relation to its impact on other gaming platforms. The UK's Competition and Markets Authority, for instance, recently said the deal would give rise to the "realistic prospect of a substantial lessening of competition in gaming consoles, multi-game subscription services, and cloud gaming services." It's in this climate that Xbox boss Phil Spencer last week attempted to placate concerns it might be looking to make the hugely popular Call of Duty series - which the CMA called "important and capable of making a material difference to the success of rivals' gaming platforms" - an Xbox exclusive if the acquisition gained approval, insisting that it had "provided a signed agreement to Sony [in January] to guarantee Call of Duty on PlayStation, with feature and content parity, for at least several more years beyond the current Sony contract". Read more  ( 16 min )
    CD Projekt says it's already "thinking about" multiple new Witcher games
    It's probably not much of a surprise given CD Projekt's previous assertion that its currently in-development new Witcher game would mark the start of a "new saga for the franchise", but the studio has now explicitly confirmed it's already "thinking about" new instalments beyond that. Asked to elaborate on the company's use of the word "saga" during CD Projekt's latest earnings call, president and joint CEO Adam Kiciński clarified that "like the first saga was three games...we are in pre-production of the first game from the second Witcher saga." As such, the studio is already "thinking about more than one game". Hardly a shocking revelation, admittedly, but additional clarity is always welcome. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Splatoon 3 hones and refines the series to new heights
    Whether a game console is a smash hit or an abject failure, I find myself drawn to all of them - and typically there's at least one killer game you have to play. Nintendo's Wii U arguably fits into the latter category, despite the fact that the system actually has a bunch of exceptional releases - and one of those titles is the original Splatoon, effectively Nintendo's take on the third-person shooter genre with its own unique twist, the paint system. It's a game that oozes style, kind of like Nintendo's take on a classic Dreamcast game - and it's brilliant. Like many Wii U titles, Splatoon hit Switch via a sequel: familiar in many ways, but fleshed out with a more comprehensive single-player offering and the excellent Octo expansion. Five years on, the third instalment is here - and there are plenty of changes and improvements to consider. I liked Splatoon 2, but this new release feels like a proper sequel, improving on the series' strengths and moving in new directions. The presentation instantly feels more elaborate, the single-player mode is vast and the visuals have improved. It feels like the game Nintendo has been working towards since the very beginning. That starts with your first contact with the game - a basic menu on the Wii U original with more polish on the sequel with a title sequence leading into the training sequence. Splatoon 3 makes far more of an impact, with a mysterious desert scene instantly setting the stage for what's to come. The camera then cuts to your character with a more fully fleshed-out, animation rich character customisation sequence. It then seamlessly pans over to the starting point before kicking into the training mission. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Humankind sets sights on diplomacy and espionage in first big expansion Together We Rule
    Developer Amplitude Studios has unveiled Together We Rule, the first major expansion for its historical 4X strategy game Humankind - one that'll bring new diplomacy and espionage focused additions when it launches some time this autumn. "In Humankind," Amplitude explains in its announcement," we’ve always wanted there to be more ways to win than simple military domination. And while the game’s unified victory condition, Fame, was a first step towards that, we’re now ready to take things much further". To that end, Together We Rule (which follows several smaller culture-focused DLC packs) will introduce new features - including the Congress of Humankind, Embassies, and Agents - that are intended to "help players see the world in a new light and resolve conflicts differently". Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Last of Us Part 1 players share their impressive in-game discoveries
    The Last of Us Part 1 released last week for the PlayStation 5. Being a from-the-ground remake for the current generation of consoles - and given Naughty Dog's reputation for attention to detail - everyone assumed that this release would be full of new improvements and fun inclusions along with the core gameplay. Now, these assumptions have been proven true, with The Last of Us Part 1's community sharing some of their recent discoveries online. Please note there will be spoilers for The Last of Us Part 1 in the article below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Final Fantasy 14 aiming to entice back lapsed players with new campaign
    Square Enix is launching a campaign to entice lapsed players back to Final Fantasy 14. The campaign will run from 7th September to 30th September and asks players to invite back any friends who have been inactive for at least 90 days. In return, players will receive gold chocobo feathers they can exchange for special rewards. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Microsoft's white Xbox Elite Series 2 controller is official, cheaper with stripped-back features
    Microsoft's frequently sighted white Xbox Elite Series 2 controller has been officially unveiled, and will arrive on 21st September with a cheaper price point and stripped-back features. The Xbox Elite Wireless Controller Series 2 – Core, as the device is officially known, comes with what Microsoft calls the "essential components" players need to "unleash [their] best game". Those include adjustable-tension thumbsticks, a wrap-around rubberised grip, and shorter hair trigger locks. It also supports button mapping via the Xbox Accessories app, and features a rechargeable battery capable of up to 40 hours of play on one charge. And, yes, it's white. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Pokémon Scarlet and Violet Switch OLED model announced
    Nintendo has announced a Nintendo Switch OLED model with new designs based on Pokémon Scarlet and Violet which will go on sale shortly before the game releases. The news arrived alongside the latest trailer for Scarlet and Violet, which dropped earlier today. On Twitter, Nintendo posted a video of the model, complete with some shiny visual effects, to show off the Scarlet and Violet inspired designs. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Splatoon 3 review - a lot more of the brilliant same
    When it comes to Nintendo's most significant releases of the past 10 years, most would - quite rightly - point towards the towering achievement of The Legend of Zelda: The Breath of the Wild, though for me there's a game that came out a few years before that's every bit as important. The Wii U era was a commercial nadir for Nintendo, enlightened by the spark of something new; the lurid splash of colour that was Splatoon, a long-awaited all-new IP from the house that built Mario, and an impeccably enjoyable subversion of the modern-day shooter. For a company that can be too quick to fall back on the familiar, it offered the shock of the genuinely new. What's more, Splatoon was a huge success and has since become nothing short of a phenomenon, with convenience stores in Tokyo stocked with o…  ( 21 min )
    Sony's new PS5 model uses less power during games
    The insides of Sony's newest PS5 model have been redesigned to use less power. A new lighter model was spotted last month in Australia, though it was unclear what changes had been made. Now, YouTuber Austin Evans has ripped open the new model to discover plenty of changes (thanks The Verge). Read more  ( 15 min )
    New Pokémon Scarlet and Violet trailer shows off more of its open world
    A new trailer for Pokémon Scarlet and Violet details more of what we can expect to find in its open world. That includes three new Pokémon introduced here: the crab-like Klawf, plus the fire warrior Armarouge (Scarlet), and its ghostly counterpart Ceruledge (Violet) - could these be Bisharp regional evolutions? Titled Seek Your Treasure, the trailer introduces the Treasure Hunt that forms a special independent study project depending on the version played. Check it out below. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Guardians of the Galaxy director once pitched a Hitman movie
    Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn has said he once pitched a Hitman movie, but it never saw the light of day. Sharing the news on Twitter, Gunn revealed he made the pitch for a film focused on IO Interactive's bald and ever adaptable assassin just "weeks" before he got the Guardians of the Galaxy gig. "The studio really wanted to hire me, but a producer on the project did not," he recalled. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Phantom Liberty may be the only planned expansion for Cyberpunk 2077
    It looks like Phantom Liberty could be the only planned expansion for Cyberpunk 2077. Yesterday, CD Projekt Red confirmed the name of the forthcoming expansion due in 2023 and the return of Keanu Reeves as Johnny Silverhand during its Edgerunners livestream. However, a comment on a YouTube video teasing the expansion suggests it could be the only one. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Humble Bundle's September Choice games have been announced
    Humble Bundle has announced the games included in its September Choice. Humble Choice is a subscription service which offers a monthly set of games to own forever, as well as access to the Humble Games Collection library and members-only discounts in the store. This month's Choice games are: Read more  ( 16 min )
    Corecell hits back at publisher PQube over funding dispute
    Corecell has hit back at publisher PQube, disputing its defence over withheld funds. Last week, PQube was under fire once again from a developer (Corecell) releasing a damning statement against the publisher. It followed earlier accusations from Coffee Talk developer Toge Productions that left the team "feeling manipulated and exploited". With regards to its game AeternoBlade 2, Corecell claimed that PQube "only paid a small part of the minimum guarantee of the signing milestone by the time we sent them the game and they never paid the remaining milestones", among other issues over publishing control. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Gloomwood is stealthy Victoriana incarnate - and it's already super good
    Gloomwood came alive for me when I got outside. This is immersive-sim-ish territory, everything tilted towards horror and stealth. Navigating the lovingly rendered PS1 era visuals, which do help a great deal to make ordinary objects singular and creepy, I awake at the bottom of a pit with nothing but a mysterious ally, taunting me through a nearby grate before offering me a magic ring. The ring allows me to tell when I'm hidden in shadow, and once it's on my hand and the grate has been opened, I start to realise how useful it's going to be. My ally is nowhere to be seen. Instead I'm in small squirrely rooms, keeping out of the path of patrolling guards, lurking in the dark, moving from one safe spot to the next. I need to get out, which might mean finding the objects needed to call a kind of grain elevator, and may mean busting my swordstick out of a nearby lockup. Gloomwood's linear but roomy: like I say, immersive-sim territory. I always know where I want to go, but my path there has a bit of leeway to it. Combat I quickly discover, even with the swordstick, is a bad idea. Take guards on and they'll slice your health away and slow you down. So much better to crouch, go slowly, considering the surfaces you're moving across, using the leaning buttons to check around blind corners, using patience, sweet patience, to learn the patrol routes and then go for the one-hit backstab. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Here’s a closer look at MultiVersus’ Gremlin fighter Gizmo
    Following a small delay, Gremlin hero Gizmo will soon be making his debut in Warner Bros.' Smash-like brawler, MultiVersus. In anticipation of his arrival, the team has shared more about Gizmo's moveset and confirmed that he will be a support character, much like the likes of Scooby-Doo's Velma. The small card shared on the MultiVersus Twitter feed states that Gizmo will have a move called "Gizmo-A-Go-Go". This will see Gizmo attaching himself onto the back of his allies. He will also be able to "sing and spawn musical note projectiles" that will damage nearby enemies thanks to a move called Song of the Mogwai. Read more  ( 15 min )
    New Xbox noise suppression function will mute your breathing
    A new noise suppression feature is available now on Xbox Series X/S to remove unwanted noises in voice chat. That includes the clicking of gamepad buttons, unnecessary background noise, and yes, the sound of your breathing. The feature can be enabled or disabled in the Options part of the Parties & Chats section of the guide. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Umbrella Academy assassin Hazel comes to Call of Duty Vanguard and Warzone in new bundle
    Following on from the Cha-Cha bundle introduced at the end of last month, a new bundle for Call of Duty Vanguard and Warzone now brings even more from Netflix's The Umbrella Academy to the fray. This bundle, known as the Hazel Bundle, will allow players to "suit up" as Umbrella Acadamy's other time travelling assassin Hazel (the clue was in the name there), thanks to the new legendary operative skin. It comes with the pink dog head and all, and is available now. "Everything happens like it's supposed to... including your enemies getting eliminated," reads the teaser for this latest Call of Duty collaboration, which you can see for yourself below. Read more  ( 15 min )
    PS5 system update adds gamelists and 1440p output
    A system update for the PlayStation 5 is now live, adding in a number of new features previously available in beta. That includes gamelists, essentially folders, to make organising your game collection more manageable. Players can have up to 15 lists, with 100 games per list. 1440p HDMI video output is also available for those with compatible TVs or monitors. Read more  ( 15 min )
    MultiVersus review – more than just another Super Smash Bros. clone
    I wasn't entirely convinced by MultiVersus when it leaked. We've seen countless platform fighters challenge Super Smash Bros across the decades, usually falling flat. Even Sony's own attempt with PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale was middling, so I didn't particularly rate a Warner Bros crossover's chances. I'll gladly admit those initial impressions were wrong. Even as a free-to-play game, that carries the usual monetisation pitfalls, MultiVersus sets itself apart where it matters. You can attribute some of that to the unusual MultiVersus character roster, which isn't especially cohesive. Packing 18 fighters with more planned, they all fall under Warner Bros. Discovery's licensing, but mixing Game of Thrones characters with Bugs Bunny just feels strange, no matter how you slice it. That said, I never questioned it once I started playing - everyone's been well adapted. That's helped by voice actors reprising their roles, with Kevin Conroy and Matthew Lillard returning for Batman and Shaggy respectively as major highlights. It's a shame MultiVersus doesn't give each franchise a specific arena to complement its cast, though you'll spot familiar sights like the Bat Cave. It's worth studying each character beforehand, since MultiVersus groups them between five classes. We've got the heavy-hitting bruisers, agile assassins, defensively-minded tank class, ranged mages, and support classes who're better at buffs than damage. I appreciate this variety and the game prioritises 2v2 team fights as its main way to play, those support classes in particular helping MultiVersus to lean into this co-op emphasis well. (There's also 1v1 fights and 4-player free for all's but, annoyingly, no local co-op, which is a shame.) Read more  ( 19 min )
    Build a thriving home on the back of a beast when The Wandering Village arrives next week
    Stray Fawn's The Wandering Village - a city building sim set on the back of a giant, roaming creature - will be launching into Steam early access next Wednesday, 14th September. Announced last August, The Wandering Village tasks players with constructing a safe haven for a group of survivors in a dangerous, post-apocalyptic world. Its city building aspects might be familiar, but those are combined with resource management, rogue-like elements, and survival, all connected to the ever-moving creature, known as Onbu, the survivors now call home. "Forging a relationship between the villagers and Onbu might be challenging at times, as their interests often don’t align," Stray Fawn explains. "As a living creature, its unique body poses its own challenges for your village design. There's every chance a spike may have grown where villagers intended to place their kitchen, while a failed harvest may cause desperation and tempt villagers to draw blood from the creature for food." Read more  ( 16 min )
    PowerWash Simulator celebrates 3m players, opens nominations for next filthy addition
    PowerWash Simulator - developer FuturLab's wildly compelling dirt-busting squirt 'em up - is currently celebrating 3m million players having hoisted nozzles since the game's launch on Xbox and PC back in May. And that milestone coincides with the opening of nominations for the next filth-encrusted edifice to be added to the game. There's not much more to say on the 3m players front, which Futurlab announced on Twitter earlier today, other than to say its success is thoroughly well-deserved. Eurgamer's Robert Purchese - who wrote about the serene pleasures of PowerWash Simulator's sedate busywork in July - is far from the only member of the editorial team to have fallen in love with its daffy charms and compulsive rhythms. And if, like me, you've reached the end of PowerWash Simulator's gloriously ludicrous campaign and urgently require more things to blast back into the realms of cleanliness, the good news is FuturLab is currently working on new additions - with the developer currently taking suggestions for what should come next. Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    Nytt och gammalt när Iphone 14-serien gör debut
    Apple bjuder favorit i repris hos den ordinarie Iphone 14-familjen, medan justerad design, ny systemkrets och bättre kameror sticker ut hos Pro-syskonen.  ( 10 min )
    Airpods Pro 2 får bättre brusreducering och spatialt ljud
    Efterträdaren till 2019 års Airpods Pro är här och bestyckas med ny systemkrets, förbättrad batteritid och funktioner för att bli lättare att hitta.  ( 6 min )
    Testpilot: AOC 24G2SPU – Full HD för massorna, igen
    När AOC för tredje gången i ordning ger sig ut för att erbjuda en bildskärm för den prismedveten PC-spelaren är det mycket som är sig likt  ( 14 min )
    NASA tar RISC-V till rymden
    Processorvärldens motsvarighet till öppen källkod, RISC-V, fortsätter öka i popularitet och ska nu bli grunden till NASA:s nästa rymddatorer.  ( 5 min )
    Veckans fråga: Vilken är din primära spelplattform?
    För drygt 1,5 år sedan var PC överlägsen vinnare med 75 procent av rösterna. Den här veckan blir repris för att se hur läget ser ut nu!  ( 6 min )
    Apple avtäcker Iphone 14 idag klockan 19:00
    Ikväll går Apples "Far out"-evenemang av stapeln. Säkra kort inkluderar Iphone 14-familjen, men även Watch och Airpods kan få tid i rampljuset.  ( 6 min )
    Cyberpunk 2077 får omfattande moddstöd
    En stor uppdatering bjuder på moddstöd via Redmod, synkroniserade framgångar mellan plattformar och nya uppdrag. Därtill ges ett smakprov på nästa expansion.  ( 6 min )
    Nofio gör Valve Index trådlöst
    En Kickstarter-insamling har startats för Nofio – ett tillbehör till Valves VR-headset Index som gör enheten användbar över Wifi 6E.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    September's Pokemon Go Community Day will star Rock-type Roggenrola
    Niantic has announced the star of September's Pokemon Go Community Day. The next Community Day will take place on Sunday, September 18, from 2-5pm local time and will focus on the Mantle Pokemon Roggenrola. During this time, Roggenrola will appear more frequently in the wild, and you may even encounter a shiny one. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Weird West getting permadeath mode with two new travel encounters and a side quest
    Weird West players are getting new features when patch 1.04 drops, and one of the features is a permadeath mode. Dubbed Nimpossible Mode, manual saving will not possible. Instead, the game will auto-save your progress, and you can play and reload from that single dedicated auto-save slot only. Nimp Heads you find during your Journeys will allow you to resurrect, but once you are out of Nimp Heads, death is permanent and the auto-save file is deleted. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Sea of Thieves' next Community Day Event to celebrate Talk Like a Pirate Day
    Avast ye maties, Sea of Thieves’ next Community Day Event will take control o' the galleon September 17-18. Durin' this long weekend o' celebrations fer Talk Like a Pirate Day, a Pirate Emporium sale 'n logon gifts will be handed out, 'n reachin' the top Community Emissary Grade will raise more pesky Ancient Skeletons across the seas. The scallywags at Microsoft and Rare say this event be goin' even bigger on the rewards that weekend, wit' a stunnin' smorgasbord o' in-game 'n out-o'-game delights primed 'n ready fer yer piratin' pleasure. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Tekken 8 needs to learn from Mortal Kombat if it wants new players
    Tekken 8 was teased at EVO 2022 back at the start of August with a little cinematic that took viewers back to Kazuya’s ending cutscene from the original Tekken. You know the one, it was where we learned about his favourite hobby… throwing people he’s related to into an active volcano. This new teaser has made the series’ longterm fans excited to get ready for the next battle once again, and it’s also made me think about what I would like to see from the franchise as it moves forward onto the current generation of consoles. Before we go ahead, I should preface the rest of this article by letting you know that I am a Tekken fan, and I’ve been playing the series since I first got my hands on Tekken 2 back on the original PlayStation. Everything I’m about to say comes from a place of love for the Tekken series, and well, a little bit of envy for what the bloodier competition has been delivering to its audience. I once got the wind knocked out of me by a partner because I was juggling her as Lei Wulong, and she didn’t find it very funny. I still play Tekken. I love Tekken as much as you do. I just think it needs to evolve in its presentation – and that the developers at Bandai Namco could learn a thing or two from NetherRealm. As a fighting game, Tekken 7 has by this point proven it has everything it needs to be one of the big multiplayer powerhouses. New mechanics like Rage Arts and screw hits are welcome additions to the fighter’s formula, and after several DLC releases the roster now has just about every Tekken character a dedicated player is likely to want to see, even including some weirdo guests. Fighting game fans know at this point that Tekken 7 is a solid, good time, and that’s why it’s the best selling entry in the series. But if Bandai Namco wants to sell even more copies next time – even quicker – then how does it recruit new competitors for us to fight online? Read more  ( 20 min )
    God of War Ragnarok gameplay footage provides a look at the dwarven realm Svartalfheim
    God of War Ragnarok players will be able to visit the realm of Svartalfheim, and you get a look at the dwarven home in a short, new video. In the Game Informer video, you can see Kratos and Atreus travling through Svartalfheim in a canoe, but according to GI, there may be other ways to travel through the realm. The video not only shows off the large industrialized area but a bit of gameplay too. As you can see, Kratos can freeze geysers with his Leviathan Axe and smash hindrances like pots with his Chaos Blades. In the realm, the duo will come across mine pits, artificial water channels, and large cities that will no doubt harbor some "complex" environmental puzzles. Read more  ( 16 min )
    "It's really become an art for the team" — How Warframe's 50th frame reflects current day Digital Extremes
    It’s a massive day for Warframe fans out there, in fact, it’s kind of like Warframe Christmas right now. The Veilbreaker update is launching with new Kahl missions, Protea Deluxe has landed in-game, and perhaps most excitingly, Styanax is here. A free gift to players (for a limited time) to celebrate the 50th frame added to the sci-fi MMORPG, Styanax marks a major milestone in the ongoing journey Digital Extremes has ventured through over the last few years. Going from hail mary release of Warframe back in the day all the way to recent months as it expands its tendrils into a multi-game developer and publisher. To find out more about the design of this new frame, its conception, and how it reflects a newer and more contemporary Digital Extremes, I sat down with lead game designer Pablo Alonso, as well as newly-pink-shorted creative director Rebecca Ford (which apparently don’t even fit. Mrs Ford later informed me that a pair of sparkly pink boots will make an appearance on the next Dev Stream). Read more  ( 19 min )
    Cyberpunk 2077 is getting some brand new content, but there's bad news for old-gen players
    Yesterday afternoon CDPR gave us all a huge update on the future of Cyberpunk 2077, which has gone from strength to strength since its troubled launch and has emerged as an essential next-gen experience. Fans can look forward to a decent looking anime series that's confirmed to be 100% canon with the games, continued updates that fix issues and add little bits of content here and there, and finally: a full-fat expansion which will add tonnes of new areas, characters, and story missions to the game. Sadly, however, for those still on PS4 and Xbox One, today's 1.6 patch is the last update you will receive until you upgrade to next-gen or PC. It was always a compromise on the old consoles, and CDPR look like they're ready to let go of what is still an enormous share of the market, as pandemics, cost of living squeezes, and semiconductor shortages have made the Xbox Series and PS5 consoles a bit tricky to get a hold of. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Xbox Elite Wireless Controller Series 2 - Core is a less expensive version of the current model
    Microsoft has announced a new Elite Wireless Controller Series 2 model called Core. It's a more basic version of the current Series 2, comes in white, and features adjustable-tension thumbsticks, shorter hair trigger locks, and a wrap-around rubberized grip. It will run you $129.99. However, you can change components on the controller by opting to purchase the Complete Component Pack that comes with interchangeable thumbsticks, paddle shapes, and D-pad. The pack includes a carrying case, charging dock, and USB-C cable. It will run you $59.99 and is compatible with all Series 2 models, not just Core. Read more  ( 15 min )
    With its expansion announcement, Cyberpunk 2077 at last addresses its biggest mistake
    Finally, it has happened. CD Projekt RED has got out in front of the greatest problem with Cyberpunk 2077, and done the right thing. It’s years too late, of course – but the studio has finally done what it should’ve done before the game even released: it’s jettisoned the previous-generation versions. Yesterday’s Night City Wire broadcast wasn’t exactly groundbreaking in its content, but it did contain exciting news for those who actually enjoyed the base Cyberpunk 2077. The live stream was mostly focused around promoting the imminent release of a Cyberpunk universe anime on Netflix – and in a cool twist, that animated show is entirely canon to the games, with designs and even some of the world layout ripped right from the digital version of Night City. Bookending a whole lot of anime talk was a little bit of video game stuff, however – confirmation of a new patch which includes some new content based around the anime, and the reveal of Phantom Liberty, the hotly anticipated expansion for the game. We got to learn a little about this expansion, including the fact that it’ll be a sort of spy-thriller that sees V working for the US government, and confirmation that Keanu Reeves has returned to the recording booth to reprise his role as Johnny Silverhand for this new story. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Pokemon Scarlet and Violet will feature an open-world storyline, new Pokemon, and a Let's Go mechanic
    Nintendo has provided more information on Pokemon Scarlet and Violet by detailing multiple story paths, new features, new characters, and more Pokemon from the Paldea region. In the games, you are enrolled in a school that hosts an independent study project called A Treasure Hunt. Three stories will be woven into your adventures while traversing the Paldea region. One is called Victory Road, and it finds you going to Gyms in different locations to achieve Champion Rank. The second is Path of Legends. Here, Upperclassmen Arven will join you in search of rare ingredients called Herba Mystica. The third story is called Starfall Street and finds you challenging Team Star, a "group of delinquents" causing trouble for the school. Read more  ( 16 min )
    I joined a Classic WoW zombie horde — killing low level players has never been so fun
    Zombies have started taking over and causing havoc across Classic WoW, thanks to the legendary plague event added to the game early this morning. Across World of Warcraft, suspicious boxes can be found in hubs such as Booty Bay, which allows players to self-infect and go off and be mischievous. To find out more about the Classic WoW zombie experience, I jumped in (before the massive queue times started) and met up with several players looking to make a mess in Classic WoW, through a truly limited, special event that may never return again. My gateway to a zombie adventure was Millehouse, a level 48 Rogue in my guild who was going to great lengths to make the lives of horde players significantly spookier. They told me via in-game whispers: “I got to the crossroads and infected like 30 people. I don’t kill them, I just infect them so it can spread.” Read more  ( 17 min )
    Splatoon 3 review: you’ll buy it for the multiplayer – but its single-player story mode is an absolute blast
    A couple of weeks ago, I described Splatoon 3 as a ‘difficult game to preview’, largely because of its iterative nature. It’s like reviewing a Call of Duty game, I suppose – bits and pieces change from one game to another, but the development machine for such an established franchise has gotten so sophisticated and so well-defined that any review inevitably isn’t going to be talking about big-ticket changes. It’s a little nip here, a little tuck there, and a modest extension to an under-developed feature. To put it another way, jumping from Splatoon 2 to this latest sequel is more like renovating a beloved old house rather than outright moving. That leads to a natural early conclusion of this review, and it’s a time-honored cliche: if you liked old Splatoon, you’ll love this! It’s like that, but better! Well, duh. Obviously. This also means that the sentiment expressed in the preview carries over here; it’s a difficult game to review. I could get into the minutiae of things like new weapons, new fashion looks, a barnstorming new mode in the form of the three-way turf war, or the improved Salmon Run mode, for instance. But then I’m waxing lyrical for thousands of words getting into tight specifics that, honestly, the hardcore probably already know, having voraciously consumed pre-release content, and the casual probably don’t particularly care to know. Read more  ( 19 min )
    PS5 receives big update with highly requested new feature
    A new PlayStation 5 firmware update rolled out this morning to all owners. This is the official release of the latest major update, which entered beta late in July. All the features announced then have carried over, available to be experienced by everyone. The chief new addition is support for 1440p resolution, which is very useful for players using their PS5 with a PC monitor, or any display that can only go up to 1440p. This resolution is a midway point between the ageing 1080p, and the demanding 4K. Previously, the PS5 was only able to detect either. 1440p support can be tested using a button in the settings menu, to make sure your display supports it. Unfortunately, and quite inexplicably, running the console in 1440p turns off VRR. PS5 currently only supports VRR for 1080p and 4K. VRR allows the screen to sync its refresh rate to the framerate of the game, eliminating screen tearing and making for an overall smoother experience, even when framerate is inconsistent. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Moonbreaker playtests are starting this week, here's how to sign up
    The latest from Subnautica developer, Unknown Worlds, is turn-based tabletop game Moonbreaker. Set in a sci-fi universe, players will be able to collect and digitally paint their own figurines before showing them off during play; something my inner painter is excited for! While Moonbreaker is set to launch in Steam's Early Access later this month on September 29, playtests are currently being arranged for those who want to try out the game even earlier. Playtests will be via Steam, and the first ones will be happening on September 9 and 11 respectively. If you don't think you'll have time on those days, do not fret, as even more playtests will be happening on September 16 and 18, too. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Does Steelrising provide a much-needed Bloodborne fix?
    The veil around Steelrising has lifted, meaning early review impressions of the third-person action game, alongside all its shiny bits and blemishes, are out in the wild for the world to see. Comparisons to the rest of the genre, especially the From Software games that have set the bar, are impossible to avoid. To go alongside our in-depth review of Steelrising, Connor and Jim have sat down to talk briefly about some of the games best and dodgiest parts. You can check out that video below, which you should absolutely do if you want a quick fix of informal discussion, or the occasional botched French word here and there. Not to spoil it or anything, but Connor talks about the revolutionary France setting of the game, something they found particularly interesting throughout the process of their review. This pro comes with a chaser, the way your character’s background as a dancing, prancing automat is weaved into combat, represented as quite remarkable move sets. It’s pretty cool to look at at! Read more  ( 16 min )
    Steel Rising review — A ballet of French steampunk and Souls that’s more tedious than tour de force
    It takes a lot of guts to throw SteelRising into the Souls-like ring. It’s a popular arena, ever-growing over the last few years as more and more people dive into a genre known for intense action, a healthy challenge, and gruesome, fantastical worlds. If a game can set itself apart, like The Surge 2 or the Nioh series, history has shown the move to be worthwhile. But for every success story there are twice as many bombs, who couldn’t stand up to obvious and unavoidable comparisons to some of the best games released over the past decade. SteelRising, in my mind after a full playthrough and some change, doesn’t quite make the mark. Let’s start with what you likely already know. SteelRising is a third-person action game, where you adventure across several levels taking on an environment packed full of difficult enemies before encountering a gigantic boss posing a significant challenge. You have rechargeable healing items that are restored at set resting points, as well as a variety of consumables that aide in combat. Killing enemies provides currency which can, in turn, be used to upgrade your character and weaponry. It’s a Souls-like. Chances are if you’re reading this review, you know exactly what foundation Steel Rising is built upon. For what it’s worth, this foundation is fairly solid! Your movement as a French murder doll in the midst of combat has you weaving in-between attacks and string together powerful combos with a mix of regular, heavy, and special attacks. Put on enough pressure and you can break an enemy's posture, allowing you to land a single devastating attack. Backstabs aren’t here, but are instead replaced with a universal sneak attack you can land on any and all unaware automata. If you’re fiending for some of that Dark Souls-esque action, feats like these do indeed cause your brain to shoot off those sweet signals. Read more  ( 20 min )
  • Open

    Comic for 2022.09.07 - Rough Start
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )
  • Open

    Last-Gen RTX 2060 Is Nvidia's Best GPU Value Right Now
    For less than $230, you get ray tracing and strong 1080p gaming.  ( 67 min )
    Best Wireless Keyboards for 2022
    Whether you’re gaming from the couch, writing book on the road, or you just want a clutter-free desk, these are the best wireless keyboards we've tested.  ( 83 min )
    Best Portable Monitors 2022: Gaming and Laptop Productivity
    These are the best portable monitors to ponder if you're looking to expand real estate for your laptop.  ( 73 min )
    Best RP2040 Boards 2022
    In such a short space of time, the RP2040 has disrupted the microcontroller community and we now have a smörgåsbord of RP2040 boards to choose from.  ( 69 min )
    Apple A16 Bionic SoC to Power iPhone 14 Pro
    Apple's iPhone 14 Pro will be powered by the new A16.  ( 60 min )
    Best Computer Monitors 2022
    We break down the best computer monitors for upgrading your setup in 2022.  ( 75 min )
    Latest Raspberry Pi OS Release Brings Improved Camera and Networking Support
    A new update release of Raspberry Pi OS brings tweaks and new features to everyone's favorite single board computer.  ( 59 min )
    Nvidia RTX 30-Series Ranks First in Latest Steam Survey
    The August Steam Hardware Survey indicates Nvidia's RTX 30-series GPUs are the most popular among gamers now, followed by the GTX 10-series.  ( 63 min )
    Best X570 Motherboards 2022: ATX, Micro ATX and Mini ITX Tested
    Here are the best X570 motherboards we've tested, for your AMD Ryzen PC build needs.  ( 74 min )
    Best Thermal Paste for CPUs 2022: 90 Pastes Tested and Ranked
    We tested 90 different thermal pastes to help you find the best one to help cool your CPU.  ( 80 min )
    Get Spider-Man Remastered Free With Purchase of High-End Nvidia GPU
    Nvidia is keen to shift remaining stocks of its high-end Ampere GPUs, and is now adding bundles with newsworthy PC game releases.  ( 60 min )
    Computational Storage Comes One Step Closer with Launch of Official Specs
    Official specifications for Computational Storage have been launched, paving the way for hardware and software.  ( 59 min )
    How to Make a Minecraft Server on Raspberry Pi
    Invite your friends to play on a server that lives in your home.  ( 63 min )
    MSI Reveals AMD X670/X670E Motherboard Prices
    MSI lists four of its AMD X670 and X670E motherboards, reveals prices.  ( 64 min )
    Best Wireless Gaming Mouse, Logitech’s G Pro X Superlight Now at Its Lowest Ever Price: Real Deals
    If you're into serious gaming and want the best tools available, the Logitech Pro X Superlight wireless gaming mouse for only $99 is a no-brainer.  ( 66 min )
    AMD Shakes Up Ryzen Mobile Model Naming Scheme Ahead of Mendocino, Dragon Range
    AMD has updated its mobile CPU model numbers for 2023 ahead of a new range of CPUs, including Mendocino and Dragon Range.  ( 60 min )
    AMD Radeon RX 7000-Series and RDNA 3 GPUs: Everything We Know
    AMD's upcoming RDNA 3 architecture and the Radeon RX 7000-series will ship before the end of the year. We look into the details and rumors of when to expect these GPUs.  ( 70 min )
    Best Raspberry Pi Accessories of 2022
    From cases to keyboards, wires and cameras, these products will help you make the most of your Raspberry Pi.  ( 75 min )
    Latest PlayStation 5 Revision Uses 10% Less Power Than Predecessors
    The PS5 ‘1200’ model has a significantly smaller motherboard, and a more compact cooling system (with more copper). It also runs games while using 10% less power, a preliminary inspection has shown.  ( 64 min )
    U.S. Reveals Strategy for $50 Billion CHIPS Fund: Who Gets What?
    The $50 billion Chips Act budget will be shared between makers of logic and memory chips, developers of advanced technologies.  ( 63 min )
    Best PC and Laptop Deals
    We've gathered the top pre-built desktop and laptop deals you can find.  ( 63 min )
    Best Raspberry Pi HATs 2022: Expansion Boards for Every Project
    The Raspberry Pi HATs (Hardware Attached on Top) bring tons of extra functionality to your Pi. The best HATs allow you to build a retro gaming machine, develop an A.I., power a robot or just learn about programming.  ( 72 min )
    Elegoo Mars 3 Pro Resin Printer Review: Elegoo’s Latest Small Volume Printer
    A nice upgrade even over the Mars 3.  ( 70 min )
    The Best Raspberry Pi Cases 2022
    Find the right case for your Raspberry Pi.  ( 84 min )
    Best Raspberry Pi Pico Accessories and Add-Ons 2022
    You’ve got the Raspberry Pi Pico, but what accessories do you need to get the most from this board?  ( 68 min )
    Best microSD Cards for Raspberry Pi 2022
    We tested ten different microSD cards on three different Pi models to help you find the fastest one for your Raspberry Pi.  ( 81 min )
  • Open

    The 2K Megahits Bundle is a great looking deal
    2K have plenty of good games under their belt and they have a new 2K Megahits Bundle with some top games and some classics included together.  ( 4 min )
    Valve overhauls the Steam Store with new categories, hubs and filtering
    Previously available in Steam Labs, some of the biggest changes to the Steam Store in years are now live for everyone.  ( 4 min )
    The Zachtronics Solitaire Collection is out now
    They will be missed and this is technically now actually their last game, with the The Zachtronics Solitaire Collection officially out now with Linux support.  ( 4 min )
    Comedy point and lick adventure Nine Noir Lives is out now
    Take on the detective role in Nine Noir Lives, a new "point and lick" comedy adventure game out now.  ( 4 min )
    Narrative adventure 'I Was a Teenage Exocolonist' out with Linux support
    I Was a Teenage Exocolonist seems like a hard game to pin to a genre. It's a blending of a narrative adventure with RPG elements, deck-building and much more.  ( 4 min )
    A new Steam Deck Beta fixes various bugs causing crashes
    Valve continues rolling out smaller updates to the Steam Deck Beta, with another update out now fixing some crashing issues.  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Rykte! Ubisoft avslöjar FLERA Assassin's Creed-titlar på lördag
    Däribland ett som äger rum i feodala Japan.  ( 7 min )
    Planet of Lana
    Bäst på Gamescom, om FZ:s utsända själv får välja.  ( 7 min )
    Ny Pokémon Scarlet/Violet-trailer handlar om skattjakter
    Och en hel del annat, visar det sig.  ( 6 min )
    Dead Space-remaken kräver en rätt ny processor
    Delar av systemkraven släppta.  ( 6 min )
    Phantom Liberty den "enda planerade expansionen" till Cyberpunk 2077
    Första och sista?  ( 6 min )
    NZXT Signal 4K30 – perfekt om man avskyr ljud
    NZXT lanserar ett helt bedrövligt inspelningskort, som måste tillbaka till ritbordet.  ( 16 min )
    Steelrising
    Ett fascinerande soulslike mitt i franska revolutionen. Men det borde ha gjorts bättre.  ( 10 min )
    Bygg om Cyberpunk 2077 - modverktyget Redmod släppt
    En chans att själv fixa saker du är missnöjd med.  ( 6 min )
    Snabbkollen - Hur bra blir Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty?
    Kan CD Projekt återupprätta sitt goda namn?  ( 6 min )
    Playstation 5 har fått stöd för 1440p-upplösning
    Äntligen!  ( 6 min )
    Grått kamouflage är på väg till Playstation 5 och dess tillbehör
    För gamern som inte vill bli upptäckt under älgjakten.  ( 6 min )
    3 miljoner spelare har städat virtuellt i Powerwash Simulator
    Roligare än att städa på riktigt?  ( 6 min )
    Firewall Ultra har utannonserats till Playstation VR2
    Uppföljaren till Firewall: Zero Hour.  ( 6 min )
    Tencent köper in sig i Ubisoft-ägarnas holdingbolag
    Och de får även möjlighet att köpa mer av Ubisoft.  ( 6 min )
    Svartalfheim bjuder på pussel i ny God of War Ragnarök-video
    En tripp till dvärgarnas boning.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    What's better: physics freakouts or beautiful food?
    Last time, you decided that a really big unreal place is better than going undercover. Good. Very good. Great deciding, reader dear. I'm wholly impartial, of course, but I am glad you haven't forced me to come up with some contrived reason to jam a really big unreal place back into the running. We can continue. This week, it's a question of jarring vs. juicy. What's better: physics freakouts or beautiful food? Read more  ( 17 min )
    Rivals and Family dev is back with with more musical puzzle action in Riley & Rochelle
    The musical mastermind behind Rivals and Family is back with a new game. Riley & Rochelle follows the two titular talented musicians, former lovers and eventual superstars, while you as the player are tasked with uncovering the secrets of their lives to find the reveal them. With Tim Sheinman joining forces with writer Natalia Yanchak, Riley & Rochelle continues the playstyle of Sheinman's previous interactive puzzle games, where you traverse through muscical memories both good and bad. Take a look at the new reveal trailer below. This time you're cast as someone making a movie about Riley and Rochelle. You must extract truths from diary entries, voicemails and other characters to correctly put together the timeline. Use your knowledge, deductive skills and appreciation for “naughty” 90s culture to succeed. Prepare to correctly answer different quizzes (the screenshots show an Audio Quiz and a Fan Fiction quiz) to test your Riley and Rochelle knowledge in the game. You'll even have to research real-life events to get to the bottom of things. As with Sheinman's other games, though, music is the real star. A big part of the game is listening to audio recordings and songs sung by Rochelle and Riley, original tracks written for the game, to ascertain where, if, and how their relationship will end. Read more  ( 16 min )
    We almost got a Hitman movie directed by James Gunn
    The Hitman games are often good and usually fun, it’s fair to say, particularly the recent World Of Assassination trilogy. Ian Hitman’s turn in the two films released about his adventures has been rougher to recommend, though. That’s why it’s simultaneously disappointing and awesome to learn that Guardians Of The Galaxy, The Suicide Squad and – shudder – Slither director James Gunn narrowly missed his target when he pitched a Hitman movie. Read more  ( 17 min )
    The joy of Rollerdrome’s practical weapons
    3rd person skater/shooter Rollerdrome has some really cool weapons, but what is it that makes them so special? I mean, there’s only four of them, and you’re forced to constantly perform tricks to regain ammo, which doesn't make them easy to use. I think it’s because of their more literal significance in the game. Rollerdrome threatens you with multiple enemy types called Houseplayers, all formidable, especially in the heat of battle when they combine their efforts. Luckily, the four distinct weapons you’re equipped with act as an equaliser; each weapon is a solution for a particular enemy. Developers Roll7 could have easily added a bunch of copied and pasted guns from every generic shooter, but instead they were more intentional about the weapons they included, with each weapon complimenting the gunplay and the game as a whole. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Red Dead Redemption 2 is the latest game to add FSR 2.0 support
    Red Dead Redemption 2 now has official FSR 2.0 support, as of the just-released 1.31 update. This makes Rockstar’s cowboy epic/improvised teleconferencing software the latest game to work with AMD’s upscaler without mods; an unofficial FSR patch for RDR2 has been out for a while, but this update should make it even easier to simply enable or disable FSR in the settings menu. Alongside its rival, Nvidia DLSS, which Rockstar also added last year. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Humankind's first major expansion resorts to diplomacy in autumn
    Sega and devs Amplitude have revealed the first hefty expansion for their Civ-alike strategy Humankind launches sometime this autumn. Together We Rule adds six new civilizations to play as, and introduces some new diplomatic and spying options to save you from having to attack everyone all the time. Have a watch of the rather neat trailer for Together We Rule below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Tencent are working in concert with Ubisoft’s founding family after €300m investment
    Chinese media giants Tencent have invested €300 million (£260 million) in the company operated by Ubisoft’s founding family, the Guillemots. The deal will see Tencent bring some of Ubisoft’s most well known game series to mobile, and to PC in China. Tencent’s investment in Guillemot Brothers Limited follows speculation last month that they were looking to take out a bigger stake in Ubisoft, even becoming the single largest shareholders. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Steelrising review: this steampunk Soulslike take on the French Revolution doesn't execute on its cool premise
    I'm an enormous fan of the premise of Steelrising (which is good, because enormous fans are also a weapon in it). In it, we're whisked to an alternative history where King Louis XVI stopped the French Revolution before it properly got going by, err, killing everyone with steampunk robots. You're Aegis, a feminine robot created to entertain and protect Queen Marie Antoinette. Marie, safe outside Paris but somewhat peeved at her husband's new penchant for extreme mass murder, sends you on a Soulslike mission to sort it all out. This takes some doing, but luckily Aegis is a very advanced robot, the bestest of all the robots. Slight but adaptive with it, and even having an advanced AI, Aegis can carve a swift path through the more than usually twisted metal in her way. It's a bit too easy, in fact. Read more  ( 20 min )
    AeternoBlade 2 devs hit back at PQube over game's publishing rights
    Indie developers Corecell have responded to UK-based publisher PQube with another statement this time critiquing PQube’s contention that they tried to return the console rights to action puzzler AeternoBlade 2. Corecell came forward last week with the second accusation made by an indie team against PQube in less than a month, following A Space For The Unbound devs Mojiken Studio’s claims in late August. Both studios claim PQube withheld money from them. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Ubisoft are announcing loads of Assassin’s Creed games on Saturday, leakers claim
    What sounds like the entire Assassin’s Creed line-up for Saturday’s Ubisoft Forward presentation may have been leaked online. Unnamed sources have supposedly told TryHardGuides that three new AC games will be announced during the event, with an instalment set in feudal Japan being among them. Bloomberg backs up the report, stating that the other games purported to be in development include one set in the 16th century that could be dealing with witches, and a mobile game set in China. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Over Jump Rally's demo is a fan-created homage to Sega Rally
    I have lovely, blue sky memories of Sega Rally, and I'm not the only one. Over Jump Rally is a fan-created homage to Sega's forgotten arcade racer built in Unreal Engine 5, and there's a demo available now if you want to get your wheels dirty. Read more  ( 16 min )
    One of the best value AMD CPUs for gaming is 32% off at Amazon UK
    The AMD Ryzen 5 5600 is a cheaper, better-value version of the Ryzen 5600X - the CPU took the world by storm when Ryzen 5000 launched back in 2020. With six cores and 12 threads to access, you get good performance in modern game engines, while the higher single-core speeds introduced with this generation of AMD processors allows for better performance in single-core-limited (often older) games. It's a potent combination that makes the 5600X - and the 5600 - the best value AMD CPUs for gaming out there. Normally the 5600 retails for £173, in comparison to £185 for the 5600X, but today it's down to £150 on Amazon, coming within £10 of the best price we've ever seen on this model. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Out Of Hands is a wiggly indie thriller with a lot of digits
    I didn’t think your average, everyday, common-all-garden hands bothered me at all. Not until I saw several scrunching up, pretending to be the eyes, nose and mouth of someone’s face in images from upcoming psychological horror card game Out Of Hands. See, Out Of Hands has a slight fixation on the ol’ phalanges. Witness for yourself in the trailer below. Read more  ( 17 min )
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    Godot 4.0 Alpha 16 Released With More Vulkan Renderer Improvements
    Ahead of the upcoming Godot 4.0 Beta, this impressive open-source game engine has been tacking on a few more improvements in another Godot 4.0 alpha build...  ( 4 min )
    AMD Details New Model Numbering System For 2023 Mobile Processors
    Due to bringing a number of new SoC designs to market next year and trying to make their model numbers easier to decipher, AMD announced this morning a new naming system for Ryzen mobile processors...  ( 4 min )
    Blender 3.3 Released With Intel oneAPI Backend, Improved AMD HIP Support
    Blender 3.3 is out this morning as the newest version of this widely-used, open-source and cross-platform 3D modeling software...  ( 5 min )
    Raspberry Pi OS Updated With Desktop Improvements, NetworkManager, Picamera2
    The Raspberry Pi Foundation has just announced a new release of their Debian-based Raspberry Pi OS (formerly known as Raspbian) as their reference Linux distribution for running on these low-cost Arm single-board computers...  ( 5 min )
    Radeon Vulkan Driver RADV Lands 3D Sparse Image Support
    The latest open-source Radeon Vulkan driver work for Mesa 22.3's RADV is enabling 3D sparse image support...  ( 4 min )
    Intel Preparing More oneAPI GPU Accelerated Components For Blender
    Blender 3.3 is set to be released today and one of the exciting enhancements with this open-source, cross-platform 3D modeling software update is initial support for Intel oneAPI/SYCL GPU acceleration. Intel Arc Graphics discrete GPUs can now enjoy this accelerated Cycles back-end, permitting your driver stack is new enough on Windows or Linux and are using their new dGPUs and not existing integrated graphics. But this is just the start of their oneAPI GPU-accelerated push for Blender...  ( 5 min )
    Latest Mesa AGX Work Points To More Apple M1/M2 Similarities With PowerVR Graphics
    Since Apple introduced the M1 two years ago as their in-house Apple Silicon for laptops and desktops with a powerful AArch64 processor and custom-designed graphics processor, there has been much speculation about whether the Apple M1 (and now M2) graphics are a clean-sheet Apple design or derived from Imagination PowerVR graphics that Apple had been using with earlier SoCs. There has been some similarities brought up before with the Asahi Linux team working on enabling the Apple M1/M2 under Linux while the latest Mesa driver activity points to more common bits between PowerVR graphics hardware and the Apple AGX graphics...  ( 6 min )
    Bytecode Alliance Preparing For Wasmtime 1.0 Releasing Later This Month
    Formed back in 2019 by Intel, Mozilla, and Red Hat was the Bytecode Alliance to promote running WebAssembly (WASM) everywhere. As part of the Bytecode Alliance initiatives they have been developing Wasmtime as a WebAssembly run-time and later this month they plan to christen version 1.0...  ( 5 min )
    Apache NetBeans 15 IDE Released
    Following a slight release delay, yesterday saw the release of NetBeans 15 by the Apache Software Foundation as this Java-focused integrated deevelopment environment that also supports C/C++, PHP, JavaScript, and other languages...  ( 4 min )
    Mesa 22.3-devel Lands Latest Workarounds For Intel Arc Graphics
    While Intel Arc Graphics is already running on the open-source Linux driver stack, Intel engineers continue improving upon and refining that DG2/Alchemist graphics card support. Overnight some fresh workarounds were merged into Mesa 22.3-devel as the latest Linux driver improvements for Intel's forthcoming discrete graphics cards...  ( 4 min )
    Intel Prepares Updated Linux Graphics Driver Handling For GPU Firmware
    Back in July I called attention to the issue how Linux 5.19 was set to break Alder Lake P graphics support unless moving to new graphics micro-controller "GuC" firmware in tandem. That user-space breakage is frowned upon and following that article the upstream DRM kernel maintainers outlined explicit requirements around firmware not breaking driver support. Intel engineers ended up submitting a quick fix for Linux 5.19 to still support the existing firmware while now a more adequate solution has been devised...  ( 5 min )
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    Spout Off
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    Antoine Beaupré: Deleted GitLab forks from my account
    I have just deleted two forks I had of the GitLab project in my gitlab.com account. I did this after receiving a warning that quotas would now start to be enforced. It didn't say that I was going over quota, so I actually had to go look in the usage quotas page, which stated I was using 5.6GB of storage. I found that puzzling: maybe wallabako? I build images there in CI... Or the ISOs in stressant? Nope. The biggest disk users were... my forks of gitlab-ce and gitlab-ee (now respectively called gitlab-foss and gitlab-ee, but whatever). CE was taking up roughly 1GB and EE was taking up the rest. So I deleted both repos, which means that the next time I want to contribute a fix to their documentation — which is as far as I managed to contribute to GitLab — I will need to re-fork those humongous repositories. Maybe I'm reading this wrong. Maybe there's a bug in the quotas system. Or, if I'm reading this right, GitLab is actually double-billing people: once for the source repository, and once for the fork. Because surely repos are not duplicating all those blobs on disk... right? RIGHT? Either case, that's rather a bad move on their part, I feel like. With GitHub charging 4$/user/month, it feels like GitLab is going to have to trouble to compete by charging 20$/user/month as a challenger... But maybe it's just me: I'm not an economist, surely there's some brilliant plan here I'm missing... In the meantime, free-ish alternatives include Quay.io (currently free for public repos) and sr.ht (2$/mth, but at least not open-core, unfortunately no plan for a container registry). And of course, you can painfully self-host GitLab, sr.ht, gitea, pagure, or whatever it is the current fancy gitweb.  ( 1 min )
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    Things You Should Not Do
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    We’ve finally seen Return To Monkey Island in action: looks great, full of laughs
    Grossman, Gilbert talk to us while playing final build, tease a 32-year-old secret.  ( 6 min )
    Mini-review: Dell’s XPS 15 9520 is a low-key improvement to an established design
    If previous XPS 15 models have turned you off, this one won't change your mind.  ( 5 min )
    New 8K video footage showcases Titanic shipwreck in stunning detail
    OceanGate Expeditions shot the footage earlier this year with a manned submersible.  ( 7 min )
    Leaked “shopping list” reveals Russia’s most “desperately” needed war tech
    Ukraine says Russia's military arsenal has dwindled by nearly half.  ( 5 min )
    FCC has obtained detailed broadband maps from ISPs for the first time ever
    FCC aims to release the most accurate US-wide broadband map to date in November.  ( 6 min )
    Chrome patches high-severity 0-day, its 6th this year
    Security hole exists in a browser component known as Mojo.  ( 4 min )
    Brazil halts sales of charger-less iPhones, fines Apple $2.3 million
    Selling iPhones without chargers only passes burden on to the consumer, feds say.  ( 5 min )
    We peek inside Porsche’s private Le Mans race car test
    Ars attended a test for the new hybrid endurance prototype car, the 963.  ( 6 min )
    Samsung starts shipping Android 12L after a six-month wait
    Google's tablet-focused release is finally coming to large-screen Samsung devices.  ( 5 min )
    Archaeologists unearth remains of 17th century female “vampire” in Poland
    Female skeleton was buried with sickle placed across her neck and a padlock on big toe.  ( 6 min )
    Hyper’s 140 W charger is a smaller brick for the biggest MacBooks
    Gallium nitride allows for more ports, smaller size than Apple's charger.  ( 5 min )
    With Stable Diffusion, you may never believe what you see online again
    AI image synthesis goes open source, with big implications.  ( 6 min )
    Astounding new Webb image reveals tens of thousands of young stars
    This stellar nursery is located in the Large Magellanic Cloud.  ( 5 min )
    Best of 2000 AD proves why the comics are classic
    New anthology of British series actually manages to collect the work that makes it great.  ( 6 min )
    Steam Deck offers elegant dual-screen emulation for 3DS, Wii U
    Valve hardware provides a simple, authentic emulated experience.  ( 5 min )
    Ireland fines Instagram 405M euro for failing to protect children’s data
    Facebook is reviewing the decision.  ( 5 min )
    European space chief “cannot see” a return to cooperation with Russia
    "We cannot work with a partner who is completely trampling on those values."  ( 6 min )
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    The Asus RTX 3080 Tuf Gaming OC V2 is down to £650 at Overclockers
    During the first wave of RTX 3080 reviews, when we had no idea of the graphics card supply shortage to come, I remember being really impressed by the Asus Tuf Gaming model. It didn't look particularly special on the outside, but it consistently beat even more expensive models in terms of thermals and performance. I resolved to get one for myself, but things went mad and I only eventually managed to get one through my work. Now though, you can get the upgraded version of that high-performer at a more reasonable price: £650 for the Tuf Gaming OC V2, an overclocked model offering excellent performance for £400 below this model's UK RRP. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Weird West is getting permadeath and a new aiming mode in its next patch
    On September 13th, patch 1.04 will arrive for Weird West. The twin-stick shooter slash immersive sim slash supernatural cowboy bonanza has had several post-release quality-of-life updates, and 1.04 has some substantial additions of its own, including a new permadeath mode and an alternative aiming system. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Gloomwood's Thief-with-guns 'em up sneaks into enters early access
    I saw people referring to Gloomwood as "Thief with guns" and thought, 'ah, bit reductive that. I'll come up with--' oh no wait its URL is thiefwithguns.com. Fair enough. It is an accurate description, and if you've enjoyed its demos during various Steam Fests, you'll be pleased to know it's now out in Steam Early Access. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Gundam Evolution, a free-to-play mech shooter, will launch this month
    Gundam Evolution is a free-to-play first-person shooter about piloting the famous anime mechs. A new video released today outlines both the game's release date - September 21st - as well as the post-release updates you can expect, including the season pass and the first batch of additional mechs. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Keanu is back for next year's Cyberpunk 2077 expansion Phantom Liberty
    In a new Night City Wire tonight, CD Project Red played the strongest card they have in their Cyberpunk 2077 deck, that being Keanu "Nicest Guy In Hollywood" Reeves. America's bad-ass actor dad played semi-imaginary rock anarchist (I know I'm being reductive, don't leave comments) Johnny Silverhand in the main game, and he popped up to confirm he's back for 2023's expansion - which we now know is officially called Phantom Liberty. There's also the Edgerunner update dropping today, a tie-in for the Netflix anime Edgrunners (more info on that was also revealed tonight), and free-to-play mini game featuring Roach the horse, because we all like Roach the horse. Read more  ( 17 min )
    CD Projekt say Netflix's Cyberpunk: Edgerunners is "100% canon", reveal cameos from Cyberpunk 2077 cast
    CD Projekt broadcast a Night City Wire stream today to give the lowdown on anime series Edgerunners and details of a tie-in update for Cyberpunk 2077. Edgerunners debuts on Netflix on September 13th, and producer Bartosz Sztybor explained a bit more about what to expect from the series. You can watch Edgerunners’ NSFW trailer below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Indie citybuilder The Wandering Village finally brings its giant turtle to town next week
    We PC gaming folk have built cities in different time periods and weather conditions, on a vast array of worlds and even in VR. I don’t think I’ve ever built one on the back of a giant animal after the apocalypse, though. Indie sci-fi citybuilder The Wandering Village will let me do that when it enters early access on Steam on September 14th. See the great lumbering beast for yourself by watching the trailer below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    This Celeste-like Metroidvania has already set a high bar for games in 2024
    2024 seems impossibly far away given the state of the world right now, but with today's announcement of Lucid, a new Metroid-y Celeste-like from The Matte Black Studio and Apogee Entertainment, at least we'll have a cool new video game to look forward to when it eventually rolls round. I got a sneaky early peek at Lucid behind closed doors at PAX East earlier this year, and let me tell you, its gorgeous pixel art and emphasis on air dashing through crystalline barriers with a honking great axe looks rad as hell. Let's admire its gleaming reveal trailer below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Crop rotation is an unexpected joy in town-builder Farthest Frontier
    Playing settlement-building survival game Farthest Frontier has me planning a lot. I'm planning outposts to mine distant resources. I'm planning road and neighbourhood layouts to optimise movement and happiness. I'm planning defences to fend off bandits. But most of my thought is going on farming, planning my crop rotations to optimise fertility and yields. Finally, I have a use for everything school taught me about the three-field system and the nitrogen cycle. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Sea Of Thieves is boosting XP to celebrate Talk Like A Pirate Day
    Rare’s pirate adventure Sea Of Thieves is marking this year’s International Talk Like A Pirate Day a few days early for its Season Seven Community Day on September 17th. This season’s special event busts out boosts to the game’s Renown progression system, kicks off a skeletal infestation, and might even land you a very fancy hat. Put on your eyepatch and have a watch of what’s in store for the event below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Tabletop battler Moonbreaker is holding multiple playtests this month
    Sci-fi tabletop sim Moonbreaker is getting two rounds of playtests on Steam in September ahead of its launch into early access, devs Unknown Worlds have revealed. These run on September 9th to 11th and again on September 16th to 18th, giving access to most of the game. You can take a look at Moonbreaker in action from its announcement at last month’s Gamescom below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    More Skate playtest footage has ollied its way online
    The latest playtest build of the next in EA’s Skate series appears to have leaked, continuing the pattern that seems to have been established for the game over the past few months. Footage from the build was shared by Reddit user Parzalai, who said they had been banned from their EA account for leaking a previous build. Modders have been running their own multiplayer servers based on leaked builds of skate. for months, so it’s not surprising to see further leaks spring up from the game’s playtests. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Railbound review: a charming, first class puzzler
    The sight of a two-carriage train is normally something that prompts a deep sigh of despair from me in real life. Nine times out of ten, it's a sign that something's gone wrong further up the line - that someone, somewhere, has sent out a train with half its usual number of carriages, and is therefore destined to ruin everyone's day in the process by cramming us all in like a pack of sardines. In Afterburn's adorable train puzzler Railbound, however, two carriages are a cause for celebration. In a game that's about guiding numbered compartments onto the back of an engine (using a limited number of track tiles to get them there in the right order), two-carriage puzzles offer the perfect amount of cerebral head-scratching. They've got a bit more bite than simply guiding a single carriage to its destination, but they're not so complicated that they'll repeatedly make you reach for the hint button to help you fill in the gaps. Railbound has a tendency to be a bit too abstract in its later stages, but more on that in a sec. All you need to know right now is that there are plenty of smart ideas to wrap your head around here, and that you'll be grinning from ear to ear by the time you reach the end of the line. Read more  ( 19 min )
    RPS@PAX West 2022: Our top highlights from the showfloor
    As PC setups are carefully packed away and booths are dismantled, the curtain closes on another PAX West and it's time to say goodbye to Seattle (for now anyway). After four packed days of demos, panels, interviews, and lots of fruit smoothies, Liam and I are completely PAXed out, but we're not done quite yet. Below you'll find something a little different from our usual daily round-ups. For our last day at PAX, we've done a super, uber, mega round-up on the entire event. We list off our favourite panel moments, the best game demos we played, and our general opinion on how the overall convention went. Click play below to see one of our last videos from the event: Read more  ( 16 min )
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    Amazon drivers unionize after AI sends them on 'impossible' routes
    Being subcontractors, their working conditions ain't our problem – US giant's stance A group of delivery drivers subcontracting for Amazon in Japan have unionized, claiming the internet titan's AI software often plans routes that are impossible to complete within set deadlines.…  ( 4 min )
    Cyberattack brings down InterContinental Hotels' booking systems
    Online booking systems and other services knocked offline amid network intrusion The IT systems of InterContinental Hotels Group, the massive hospitality organization that operates 17 hotel brands around the world, have been compromised, causing ongoing disruption to the corporation's online booking systems and other services.…  ( 5 min )
    No, Apple, you may not sell iPhones without chargers
    Good for the environment? Bad for the customer, say Brazilian officials after fining iGiant, banning certain sales Brazil's government is freezing certain iPhone sales in the country and fining Apple for removing chargers from its smartphones, something officials there have declared a practice harmful to consumers, despite being presented as an act of environmental heroism. …  ( 4 min )
    US wants to give global chipmakers a 25% tax credit on new fabs
    Plus $39 billion in subsidies for 'domestic' effort that will welcome foreign semiconductor players Leading foundry operators stand to benefit from a 25 percent investment tax credit (ITC) on domestic fab projects, according to a document published by the US Department of Commerce this week.…  ( 6 min )
    California passes bill requiring salary ranges on job listings
    Legislation also aims to tackle wage gaps around gender, race, and ethnicity California lawmakers passed a bill that aims to promote pay equity by requiring employers to post salary ranges with job listings in the state.…  ( 4 min )
    Ransomware gang hits second-largest US school district
    FBI and CISA on-site to assist with incident response over Labor Day weekend Cybercriminals hit the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) over the holiday weekend with a ransomware attack that temporarily shut down email, computer systems, and applications.…  ( 5 min )
    Meta found guilty of flouting Washington political ad laws – again
    Hundreds of 'intentional' violations could cost Zuck and Co $30k each Facebook has been found guilty in Washington of breaking the state's strict campaign finance transparency laws – again – and was defeated in its attempt to get a judge to loosen those laws to favor it. …  ( 5 min )
    Newly discovered cyberspy crew targets Asian governments and corporations
    Worok uses mix of publicly available tools, custom malware to steal info, gang active since 2020 A cyberespionage group has targeted government agencies and big-name corporations throughout Asia since at least 2020, using the notorious ProxyShell vulnerabilities in Microsoft Exchange to gain initial access.…  ( 5 min )
    Instagram fined in Ireland for violating children's privacy
    Meta set to the appeal the data protection authority's near $400m penalty Ireland's data protection authority has fined Instagram almost $400 million for mishandling children's data.…  ( 4 min )
    Apple app transparency changes bring in the ad bucks... for Apple
    By striking down Google and Facebook, the iMaker's transformation is complete Although Apple's sales pitch for the idea was protecting users' privacy, it appears the company's App Tracking Transparency (ATT) initiative has been kind to its wallet as well, pushing it to the top of the mobile app advertising market in the past year.…  ( 4 min )
    Government buyers take 22 months on average to procure tech
    Teams too big, operate in silos, lack subject matter experts and C-suite exec buy-in Public sector technology buyers have the lengthiest average buying cycle of any industry vertical in part due to a lack of vendor specific information on products often hampering the decision making process.…  ( 5 min )
    Unhappy about excluding nation-state attacks from cyberinsurance? Get ready to pay
    Lloyd's defends stance as critics say policy tweaks make it less worthwhile to spend on premiums Critics unhappy about insurers excluding certain nation-state attacks from cyber policies should consider the alternative: higher prices, said a defiant Lloyd's of London.…  ( 6 min )
    IBM adds iTaaS to System I, Power 10 server bundle
    $50/user/month to bring cloud-like opex delights to midrange on-prem environments IBM has rediscovered IT as-a-service with a subscription service for its System I environment and the POWER servers that run it.…  ( 4 min )
    SK hynix to plow $11b into South Korean fab complex
    Leadership believes path to recovery is through investing in times of crisis Chipmaker SK hynix intends to invest nearly $11 billion over the next five years on a new manufacturing plant in South Korea, showing confidence in the future despite the curent dip in demand for semiconductors.…  ( 4 min )
    SoftIron to start selling 'fully turnkey' cloud platform
    Hypercloud will be facing some stiff competition in the hyperconverged infrastructure space, say analysts Storage player SoftIron is extending its portfolio to the rest of the datacenter with the launch of a complete cloud infrastructure platform - a bold effort to take on better known brands in their own back yard.…  ( 7 min )
    G7 countries beat UK in worldwide broadband speed test again
    All except Italy, that is For the second year in a row, the UK is second worst in the G7 league of industrial nations for broadband speed, only faster than Italy, according to a report published today.…  ( 5 min )
    IBM wins contract to support NHS App
    Smartphone software set to link more services to patients despite privacy fears NHS Digital has awarded IBM a £52.4 million ($60.2 million) contract for supporting and developing the NHS App, which the UK government plans to make the standard way for health services to communicate with patients.…  ( 4 min )
    Newport Wafer Fab sale to Chinese company held up again by UK.gov's probe
    To sell or not to sell... that is the national security assessment, decision delayed once more The UK government has asked for more time to make its final decision on whether to retroactively approve or block the sale of Newport Wafer Fab (NWF) company to Chinese owners.…  ( 4 min )
    A refined Apple desktop debuts ahead of Wednesday’s big iThing launch
    It’s an eight-bit affair for the Apple II, complete with Flying Toasters and many other upgrades Apple will on September 7th stage one of its live infomercials to launch products expected to include this year’s iPhone – complete with satellite messaging capabilities – plus wireless earbuds, an enhanced smart watch, and maybe even some new tablet computers.…  ( 4 min )
    Dead people could be designated authors of Atlassian Confluence docs but that can't be changed
    16-year-old feature request to fix it judged so hard it doesn’t offer bang for buck – to Atlassian After The Register covered the eleven years and counting wait for Atlassian to deliver custom domain names for its cloudy products, readers pointed out an even older open request: CONFCLOUD-7247 was filed on November 1st, 2006 and asks the software upstart to allow changes to the author of an existing page of its Confluence corporate Wiki.…  ( 5 min )
    Microsoft to stop accepting checks from partners
    Maybe it’s putting the savings into discounts for Windows Server and M365 it's told the channel to go forth and sell? Microsoft has told its north American partners they can’t pay it with checks starting from December 1st.…  ( 4 min )
    Indian tech minister picks a fight with Wikipedia over cricketer's dropped catch
    Also separatism, nationalism, and whether Big Tech does enough to police user-generated content India’s IT minister has picked a fight with Wikipedia after alleging that Pakistani entities edited a page describing a member of the men’s national cricket team in ways that suggest the player has separatist affiliations.…  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Best PC Builds for Gaming: From Sub $500 Budgets to $3000+
    Whether you’re spending $500 or $4,000 on components, we’ve picked out the perfect parts for your next PC build.  ( 73 min )
    SteelSeries Apex 9 TKL Review: Hot-Swappable Optical Switches
    SteelSeries new Apex 9 TKL and Apex 9 Mini keyboards feature hot-swappable optical switches with adjustable 2-point actuation.  ( 66 min )
    Best 4K Gaming Monitors for PC 2022: 144Hz, Curved and More
    These are the best 4K gaming monitors available in 2022, including 144Hz, curved and HDR options.  ( 81 min )
    GeForce RTX 3080 Falls to $740 Amid Continued GPU Price Cuts
    GPU prices at the start of September show a continued downward trend, particularly on the top models. Nvidia's RTX 3090 Ti has become almost affordable, and the RX 6900 XT now sits at just $700.  ( 64 min )
    Best Ultrabooks and Premium Laptops 2022
    Our picks for the best ultrabooks (super thin and light notebooks), along with other premium laptops now.  ( 78 min )
    Nvidia’s Geforce RTX 3090 Ti Is Down to Its Lowest Price: Real Deals
    It's large, expensive, and over the top! Nvidia's RTX 3090 Ti is on sale at Best Buy.  ( 67 min )
    Apple to Buy 3D NAND Memory from Chinese YMTC
    YMTC becomes a 3D NAND flash memory supplier for Apple's products.  ( 59 min )
    Best Motherboards 2022 for Gaming, by Socket and Chipset
    Here are the best Intel and AMD motherboards for all the recent processors. These boards offer great features and performance, according to our rigorous tests.  ( 79 min )
    Intel Dishes Out Game and App Codes Bundle for PCs With Arc GPUs
    Users who buy an Arc A580, A750 or A770 GPU alongside a Core i5-12600KF or better (12th Gen only) before the end of the year to qualify for a games and apps bundle potentially worth $370+.  ( 60 min )
    Best College Laptops: Tested Picks for Research, Writing, Gaming and More
    The best college laptops offer great battery life, portability and the power to tackle everything your major requires. Our list includes Windows PCs, Macs and some gaming systems for those who like to play when they aren't working.  ( 73 min )
    New Aaeon SBC Puts Alder Lake on a Tiny Board
    A new board from Aaeon, the GENE-ADP6, offers Alder Lake processors and the chance to drive four screens from a tiny form factor.  ( 63 min )
    Cooler Master Intros CryoFuze Violet Thermal Paste
    Besides the color, Cooler Master's CryoFuze Violet thermal paste delivers 12.6 W/mK and is stable at a very wide range of temperatures. It's claimed to have a balanced viscosity for easy application and removal.  ( 60 min )
    What is Quantum Computing?
    Here's an explanation of why we need quantum computing and all the details of how it works.  ( 64 min )
    Funky VRM Fan Setup Is Actually Super Useful
    A new VRM cooling solution has been created that will work in almost every computer case featuring a rear chassis fan, and it's actually quite useful.  ( 60 min )
    GPU Prices 2022: Prepping for Next-Gen
    Our GPU prices index tracks graphics cards sales and prices on eBay. Prices have continued to fall over the past month, and the next-gen GPUs are on the horizon.  ( 64 min )
    How to Set a Static IP Address on Raspberry Pi
    If you're running a local server, having a consistent IP can be helpful. Make sure your Pi has the same IP every time you boot it.  ( 61 min )
    AMD Ryzen 3 4100 and Ryzen 5 4500 Review: The Budget CPU Beatdown
    On the cusp of Ryzen 7000, AMD's Zen 2-powered Rzyen 3 4100 and Ryzen 5 4500 in an attempt to tackle Intel's Alder Lake Core i3.  ( 80 min )
    New Steam Deck Dock Houses Full-Sized M.2 NVMe SSDs, Does 4K at 60Hz
    A new docking station gives Steam Deck users access to a 2280 slot M.2 SSD for storage expansion and also connects to external displays.  ( 60 min )
    Best Gaming Monitors 2022: Budget, Curved, G-Sync and More
    Here are the best gaming monitors for PC available in 2022, from budget displays to 144Hz, 4K and curved.  ( 83 min )
    Discrete GPU Sales Dropped, AMD Loses Ground to Nvidia
    Nvidia increases its share of the desktop GPU market despite inventory corrections and a decrease in quarterly revenue.  ( 60 min )
    Lenovo ThinkPad X13s Review: Quiet Travel Buddy
    The Lenovo X13s is the first ThinkPad with an Arm processor. While it has long battery life and a silent, fanless design, performance isn't up to par with x86 notebooks, and Windows 11 still has a few compatibility issues.  ( 73 min )
    Intel 13th-Gen Raptor Lake Specs, Rumored Release Date, Benchmarks, and More
    Here's the Intel 13th-Gen Raptor Lake release date, benchmarks, specifications, pricing, and all we know about the new chip architecture.  ( 87 min )
    Best Monitor Deals 2022: 4K, Gaming and More
    There are lots of awesome monitor deals dropping every day! Here are the best offers worth your hard-earned money.  ( 66 min )
  • Open

    PlayStation 5 and PS4 hardware designer Masayasu Ito is retiring from Sony
    Masayasu Ito - Sony Interactive Entertainment's executive vice president of hardware engineering and operation, as well as lead engineer on both the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5 - is retiring on 1st October after 36 years with the company. Ito first joined Sony in 1986, where he initially worked on in-car audio equipment before joining the PlayStation division in 2000 to lead hardware engineering. Here, Ito oversaw the development of numerous key PlayStation products, including the PS3, the hugely successful PS4 - which went on to sell over 117 million units - and, starting in 2015, the PlayStation 5. Alongside Sony's flagship consoles, Ito also had a hand in many other notable PlayStation hardware releases, having created of the likes of the PSP, PS4 Pro, and PSVR headset. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Assassin's Creed games set in Japan and 16th century Europe reportedly being revealed this weekend
    Ahead of this weekend's Ubisoft Forward digital showcase, a new report has claimed the event will offer a look at three previously unannounced Assassin's Creed titles - one set in Japan, another in 16th century Europe, and a third in China. Earlier this week, Ubisoft confirmed it would be 'unveiling the future' of the Assassin's Creed franchise during this Saturday's digital showcase, but stopped short of providing specifics. A look at the recently recently confirmed Assassin's Creed Mirage seemed a certainty, but a new report has suggested the publisher might in fact have a lot more its ready to share. According to relentlessly leaky (and usually reliable) journalist Tom Henderson, writing for Try Hard Guides, Ubisoft Forward's Assassin's Creed portion will indeed begin with a "deep dive" into Assassin's Creed Mirage. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Here's a look at God of War Ragnarök's dwarven realm of Svartalfheim
    With God of War Ragnarök inching ever closer to its 9th November release on PlayStation, the pre-launch pre-amble keeps on coming, this time with a closer look at the dwarven realm of Svartalfheim in a new video. Svartalfheim is, of course, one of the Nine Realms at the heart of God of War's current Norse-themed saga, and one of three - alongside Vanaheim and Asgard - that were unreachable in the first game. Players will finally be able to complete the set in Ragnarök, though, as well as getting a chance to return to previously visited realms to explore new locations. Svartalfheim, like other realms, can be accessed via the gateway located at the centre of the Lake of Nine (frozen over in Ragnarök thanks to the onset of Fimbulwinter) and - as detailed in a new GameInformer video - will present players with plenty of dwarven ingenuity to explore, including mine pits, artificial water channels, and sprawling cities. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Tencent increases stakes in Ubisoft with €300m investment in Guillemot Bros
    Tencent is heavily investing in Ubisoft with a €300m investment in Guillemot Bros, the company run by Ubisoft's co-founders. Tencent now has a 49.9 percent stake in Guillemot Bros., which has the largest stake in Ubisoft. In turn, Tencent will bring some of Ubisoft's biggest franchises to mobile. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Keanu Reeves will return in Cyberpunk 2077's Phantom Liberty Expansion
    Keanu Reeves is set to reprise the role of Johnny Silverhand in the forthcoming Cyberpunk 2077 expansion Phantom Liberty. It will be released in 2023 across Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 5 and PC. Though details are light, it will focus on a specific district of Night City and continue V's story with a new cast and plot. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Callisto Protocol mixes new tricks with the old-school "style" of Glen Schofield
    The Callisto Protocol showed some gameplay to the public for the first time at Gamescom this year, with about three minutes of footage highlighting a bit of combat, a bit of stealth, and a slip-n-slide finish that ends with a bit of a crunch. Behind closed doors at the show, however, we saw a much longer version - albeit with the same stomach-churning finale - and had time to speak with the game's director and studio head Glen Schofield. Things begin with a jump - a scare as you open a door that then leads into a bit of one-on-one combat with one of The Callisto Protocol's more standard enemies. The twist here is that enemies in The Callisto Protocol can mutate. After you engage them in combat some tentacles will start spurting out of their torso. Shooting or otherwise battering them in the tentacles will put them down faster, the mutation acting as a kind of weak spot, but miss your fairly short window and those enemies will evolve, gruesomely, into much more resilient, aggressive opposition. Dodging becomes important - there was a lot of ducking, diving, dipping and dodging in this demo - while you club away at them with a kind of riot baton in melee, although if more than one mutated enemy starts coming at you, you'll struggle. "I think our combat is much more complex than we've made before," Schofield says, as opposed to how things were with the likes of Dead Space, this game's spiritual predecessor and the series Schofield created. "Especially with a sort of survival horror game - you've got a bunch of different weapons. I've always believed that survival horror doesn't mean you would just have one bullet, right? Survival horror, I [think] means: I've got a clip, but I still can't take them all out." Read more  ( 23 min )
    Gundam Evolution free-to-play hero shooter launches in September on Steam
    Gundam Evolution, a free-to-play hero shooter set in the world of the popular anime, is set for release on Steam this month. The game will arrive on 22nd September in Europe, with a console release across PlayStation and Xbox consoles set for 1st December. It will feature 6v6 PvP matches across three objective-based game modes: Point Capture, Domination and Destruction. Check out the action below. Read more  ( 15 min )
    New Pokémon Scarlet and Violet trailer dropping tomorrow
    A new trailer for the forthcoming duo Pokémon Scarlet and Violet is set to drop tomorrow. Keep an eye on the Pokémon YouTube channel at 2pm UK time for "the latest news". The game is set for release on 18th November, so expect more information to be divulged in the run-up to release. Read more  ( 15 min )
    September Xbox Game Pass titles announced
    Microsoft has announced the next wave of games coming to Xbox Game Pass this September. Available today is the Disney farming life sim Disney Dreamlight Valley featuring a cast of well-known characters. The game is launching in early access available across a number of platforms, with Game Pass users getting access to exclusive cosmetics and some in-game currency (across cloud, console and PC). The character creator is good fun too. Read more  ( 15 min )
    More evidence emerges Returnal could be headed to PC
    More evidence has emerged that a PC release of Returnal could be on the way. This time, it's courtesy of a GDC talk on VFX from Housemarque & Playstation Studios' Risto Jankkila and Sharman Jagadeesan. As Digital Foundry's Alex Battaglia spotted, the game appears to be running on a PC dev kit and includes a debug readout. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Tactical bullet hell RPG Grid Force out next week
    Tactical bullet hell RPG Grid Force - Mask of the Goddess is set for release on 15th September. The game comes from UK developer Dreamnauts Studio and features a diverse, all-female cast of characters. It will release first on Steam, followed by Xbox and Switch versions soon after. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Scrapped Tomb Raider film storyboards show assault on Croft Manor
    Storyboards for Alicia Vikander's scrapped Tomb Raider sequel have shown up online. These images show a planned storyline similar to one seen in Angelina Jolie's debut turn as Lara Croft, with Croft Manor being attacked by masked assailants. Shared by artist Jake Lunt Davies, the images show Lara's home on an atmospherically dark and stormy night. Meanwhile, in the grounds, several shady looking characters are depicted planning their infiltration of the manor. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Modders turn Steam Deck into Wii U GamePad
    A group of Steam Deck fans have figured out how to support gyro controls in Wii U emulation, effectively turning Valve's portable PC into Nintendo's infamous Wii U GamePad. Steam Deck HQ is a fan-run site dedicated to helping others configure their decks and set up programs to get the most out of the portable PC. A newly-shared guide shows how to get the Steam Deck's gyro controls to work in Wii U emulation. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Mario Kart Tour is Nintendo's second-highest grossing mobile game
    Mario Kart Tour has made Nintendo an estimated $293m globally to become the company's second highest grossing mobile game. That's according to data from reliable app store analytics company Sensor Tower, from across both the App Store and Google Play store. The estimates follow the recent news that Nintendo will remove gacha elements from Mario Kart Tour, which allow players to spend money on randomised rewards. This will be replaced by a rotating item shop. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Kotaku writer Mike Fahey has passed away
    Mike Fahey's bio on Kotaku read, "Lover of video games, keyboards, toys, snacks and other unsavory things." All of this is true, as any of his legion of commited readers could tell you. But in one of the all time great Fahey pieces, he offered an even better description: "I am a 6'6" man with a vivid imagination and strange thought processes." This is the Fahey that his readers truly knew - a gentle, sweet-natured giant with a brilliant mind and an eye for the angle that nobody else had thought of - a willingness to monitor a situation and just see where it went. Fahey died last week at 49 after a long illness. He was a generous, ingenious, and kind writer whose posts always left you feeling happier - and more curious about things - than you had felt when you started reading them. He did indeed love snacks and toys and keyboards, of which he reviewed plenty. He loved video games, which he covered with perceptiveness, originality, and great care. Read more  ( 13 min )
    Deltarune's next chapter won't be out this year, says Toby Fox
    Toby Fox has confirmed that the next chapter of RPG Deltarune won't be out this year. The creator shared the news on his Twitter account, saying: "We won't be able to put out any new chapters of Deltarune this year." However, he does confirm that something is on the way to celebrate the anniversary of the second chapter and previous game Undertale next week. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Kojima struggled to licence historical footage for Metal Gear Solid
    Hideo Kojima struggled to get live-action clips in Metal Gear Solid, not for technical reasons but because of a lack of contacts. In a series of tweets on his Japanese account, he shared some background information on the game celebrating the 35th anniversary of the series (thanks SiliconEra). Kojima wanted to push the realism of his fictional story using real war footage and, of course, the PlayStation console was able to play compressed film so this wasn't a technical limitation. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Heartstopper and Bloodborne actors join A Plague Tale: Requiem cast
    Developer Asobo has revealed the cast for A Plague Tale: Requiem. Charlotte McBurney and Logan Hannan will be reprising their roles as Amicia and Hugo in the upcoming sequel. In addition to the returning actors, Kit Connor and Lucy Briggs-Owen have joined the cast as new characters Lucas and Beatrice. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The Sims 4 - a game of cycles that could do with starting anew
    The Sims has been around for 22 years now, with even the fourth, and most recent, numbered entry being a venerable eight years old. My first time playing the original was a communal experience in the sixth form common room, crowded around a friend's laptop. We created a replica of said common room, populated it with facsimiles of friends and mostly left them to their own devices. One of them forgot where the toilet was and peed himself, then cried about it. The Sims 2? Not sure if I even played it. I was 21 when it was released in 2004 and, like much of my life back then, the memories are a bit fuzzy. Number three meanwhile was inspirational. Not so much the game itself, although many would say it's the high point of the series, but the writing about it. Robin Burkinshaw's "Alice and Kev", a blog chronicling the adventures of a homeless Sim and his daughter, really struck a chord and inspired me to try my hand at something similar. (It was rubbish.) Read more  ( 20 min )
    Off Topic: Il Buco is a transporting film about a really big hole
    Last week I watched Il Buco, or The Hole, the latest film from the Italian director Michelangelo Frammartino. It's mesmerising. With very little in the way of dialogue, Frammartino tells the story of a 1960s spelunking expedition that explored one of the deepest cave systems in the world. At first glance Il Buco seems filled with slightly trite opposites. The expedition comes from the urban north of Italy to the bucolic south, and one scene shows a cluster of kids gathered around a TV set that's broadcasting a news piece about the tallest building in the country, which is being constructed while the spelunkers are heading off in the opposite direction. But all of this is a distraction, I think. Or rather, it felt like Frammartino was throwing things in to the movie to allow you to ruminate and begin the process of looking for meanings. The bulk of the film is concerned with a more engaging case of opposites: an elderly shepherd spending his last days with his flock, while that hole slowly reveals its depths. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Sea of Thieves celebrating Talk Like a Pirate Day with XP-boosting community event
    Sea of Thieves is getting in the spirit of Talk Like a Pirate Day with a week of celebrations that'll include the swashbuckling multiplayer adventure's latest XP-boosting community event. The general festivities begin on Thursday, 15th September (running until Tuesday, 20th September), bringing a free Arrrgh! emote for anyone that logs in during the event, plus special Merchant Alliance fireworks, and discounts in the premium Pirate Emporium store. Additionally, players will be able to pick up a second free emote - Ranting Rogue - from the Pirate Emporium. The main event, though, is Season Seven's Community Day, running for 24 hours from 10am UTC on Sunday, 17th September. A "generous" Renown XP boost will be applied to all in-game activities for the duration, helping players work through this season's progression track more easily, and it'll be accompanied by a set of additional player-driven boosts via Twitter. Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    Louis-Philippe Véronneau: Montreal's Debian & Stuff - August 2022
    Our local Debian user group gathered on Sunday August 28th1 at the very hackish Foulab for the August 2022 edition of our "Debian & Stuff" meetings. As always, the event was a success and we had lots of fun. Nine people showed up, including some new faces and people I hadn't seen in a while: On my side, although I was badly sleep-deprived 2, I still managed to be somewhat productive! One of the WiFi Access Points we use in our 4-apartment LAN had been boot-looping for a few weeks, after a failed sysupgrade to the latest version of OpenWRT. lavamind and I suspect the flash got corrupted in a way or another during the upgrade process... Lucky for us, this model has a serial port and runs U-Boot. After a bit of tinkering, some electrical tape and two different serial adapters3, we managed to identify the pin layout and got a shell on the machine. The device has a reset button, but since the kernel panic was happening too soon in the boot process, we weren't able to get into OpenWRT's failsafe mode this way. Once we had serial access, wiping the flash and re-installing OpenWRT fixed our problem. A quick ansible-playbook run later, the device was back to being usable and configured :) I was too tired to keep track of what others did, but I took some nice pictures of the pizza we got, and of this nice blow-up Tux wearing a Foulab t-shirt. Enjoy! As always, thanks to the Debian project for granting us a budget to rent the venue and to buy some food. Please excuse the late blog post, it's Harvest Season here and I've been quite busy. ↩ A bad case of wry neck kept me from sleeping properly for a while in August. ↩ As it turns out, serial connections work better when you use the right pins for TX and RX! ↩  ( 1 min )
    Shirish Agarwal: Debian on Phone
    History Before I start, the game I was talking about is called Cell To Singularity. Now I haven’t gone much in the game as I have shared but think that the Singularity it refers to is the Technological Singularity that people think will happen. Whether that will happen or not is open to debate to one and all. This is going to be a bit long one. Confession Time :- When I was sharing in the blog post, I had no clue that we actually had sessions on it in this year’s Debconf. I just saw the schedule yesterday and then came to know. Then I saw Guido’s two talks, one at Debconf as well as one as Froscon. In fact, saw the Froscon talk first, and then the one at Debconf. Both the talks are nearly the same except for a thing here or a thing there. Now because I was not there so my understanding…  ( 18 min )
    Jonathan Dowland: Borg corrupted hints file
    I've been using Borg backup for a couple of years and it has seemingly worked very well for me. One difference I really appreciate from my previous arrangement (rdiff-backup) is the freedom to move large files or file hierarchies around (including between different filesystems) without provoking large backup incrementals. About a week ago I had my first real problem with Borg: backups started to fail with the following complaints: Creating archive at "/backup/borg::{hostname}-home-jon-{now:%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%S.%f}" segment 61916 not found, but listed in compaction data [ further, similar lines ] Local Exception Traceback (most recent call last): File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/borg/archiver.py", line 4690, in main exit_code = archiver.run(args) File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-package…  ( 1 min )
  • Open

    Ubisoft will announce multiple Assassin's Creed titles during Ubisoft Forward - report
    Ubisoft will host its Ubisoft Forward showcase this weekend, and it seems the company plans to announce multiple Assassin's Creed projects. The company has already promised to discuss Assassin's Creed Mirage during the showcase, and it's possible it will touch upon Assassin's Creed Infinity as well. Ubisoft promised previously that additional information regarding "the future" of the Assassin's Creed franchise would be shared during Ubisoft Forward, and rumor has it the company will announce three more projects for the series. According to Tom Henderson, the Assassin's Creed games we will hear about have settings in Japan, 16th-century Europe during the witch hunts, and China. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Why The Elder Scrolls 6 should look to the past to create a better future for the series
    As we keep waiting for The Elder Scrolls 6 and – way before that – Starfield, us veteran Elder Scrolls fans keep wondering about where Bethesda might take the long-awaited sixth mainline entry of their big fantasy series. Of course, we are almost sure at this point about where it’s literally going: either High Rock or Hammerfell, maybe even both. But what about everything else? More importantly, what about the unavoidable rework of its moment-to-moment gameplay and RPG systems? And beyond those elements, how big can it reasonably be? As I discussed in my previous The Elder Scrolls 6 speculation piece, most folks are looking at Skyrim and The Elder Scrolls Online to fantasize about the next game. And that’s not a mistake, especially if we consider the ridiculous amount of Skyrim re-releases we’ve had in little more than a decade; that game is hugely important for Bethesda Game Studios. Even though Oblivion made the franchise mainstream thanks to its key role as one of Xbox 360’s early must-plays, Skyrim’s shadow is nearly impossible to escape and has shaped the entire open-world genre, RPG or not. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Cyberpunk 2077's first major expansion set for 2023 release, Edgerunners-based update coming today
    CD Projekt RED has released a teaser trailer for the first expansion to Cyberpunk 2077. Titled Phantom Liberty, it's described as a spy-thriller expansion that will be set in an all-new district of Night City. Not much is shown in the teaser trailer, but the country looks like it's in trouble. As far as the storyline is concerned, well, the teaser doesn't give us much in the way of that either. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Nintendo is removing loot boxes from Mario Kart Tour which has made the company close to $300 million
    Mario Kart Tour is a rather popular mobile game for Nintendo, so much so that it has generated around $293 million for the company. This is according to Sensor Tower (thanks GI.biz), which reports the figure was generated within three years of launch. It is a rather popular game, and during its first week of availability, Mario Kart Tour topped 20 million downloads across Android and iOS worldwide. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Rocksmith+ is so much more than a sequel – it’s a life-changing educational tool
    Have you ever sat and listened to the bass riff in MGMT’s Electric Feel? I don’t think I ever realised, really, how integral to the song that little refrain is; the entire track is based around it! Ignore those hateful lyrics (hey, they’re a joke band, it’s fine), drink in those festival vibes, and let that bass sink into you… you feel it? Electric Feel is all about bass, I think. Why have I never learned to play that riff before? Well, I guess I’d never had someone show me how. Not until I was browsing the catalogues available at launch on Rocksmith+ and saw it there, nestled amongst things like Snarky Puppy’s excellent jam-rock meanderer, ‘Shofukan’, and The Eurhythmics’ seminal ‘Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)’. I was alive in the 00s, I’ve definitely been in some shit Midlands club singing along to Electric Feel – why not plug in my bass, and give it a go. Turns out, that riff is one of the most fun-to-play things I’ve committed to since picking up my bass guitar at the start of the year. I’ve only been playing the bass for nine months now, and whilst there are some transferable skills from my 17 years of guitar playing, there’s also a lot of new stuff to digest. Rocksmith+ not only gives me a fun new song to play – all mapped out, delicious, and easy-to-read with a genuinely intuitive UI – but it also identifies areas I might be struggling with and ushes me towards improving. Read more  ( 18 min )
    I've got to admit, this Rick and Morty ad for God of War Ragnarok is pretty funny
    There’s a new ad for God of War Ragnarok, featuring both Rick and Morty in a crossover I can safely say I wasn’t ready to see today. The game, launching on both PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5 on November 9 takes place in a mystical norse world filled with gods and monsters, one which the duo visited briefly all for the sake of a shiny new axe and a few gags. The ad itself does, admittedly, have a few jokes that made me giggle. Rick drunkenly summarising the base plot of many AAA narrative action adventures like God of War as journeys to make choices and face the consequences, as well as opening a massive golden chest to find the leviathan axe and “other unannounced upgrades” was just meta enough to get me on board. This isn’t the first crossover ad Rick and Morty have been a part of. Back in 2020, American fast food restaurant Wendy’s partnered with Rick and Morty to promote some of their breakfast menu, with humanoid breakfast baconator, honey chicken biscuits and an frosty-ccino rushing down and attacking the pair with pipes and bats. Fun stuff. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Disney Dreamlight Valley, Metal: Hellsinger, and more coming to Xbox Game Pass in September
    Microsoft has announced a batch of games coming to Xbox Game Pass in September alongside a list of games leaving the service. Available today is Disney Dreamlight Valley: Founder’s Edition for cloud, console, and PC. Available on day one with Game Pass, members get early access, exclusive cosmetic rewards, and in-game currency for this hybrid between a life-sim and an adventure game featuring Disney and Pixar characters. In it, you arrive in the world of Dreamlight Valley tasked with restoring a once lovely village now desolate and filled with Night Thorns thanks to a mysterious event called The Forgetting. Opus Magnum is also available today for PC. This open-ended puzzle game from Zachtronics has you trying to master intricate, physical machinery and use it to create remedies, gemstones, deadly weapons, and more. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The next Deltrarune chapter sadly won't release in 2022
    Deltarune, the episodic pixel-art RPG from beloved creator Toby Fox, won’t have a new chapter release this year. This information comes straight from the creator himself, who posted an update on Twitter conveying the news to his 1.3 million followers. While this is of course sad news for those eager to experience more Deltarune as soon as possible, there’s some chaser good news that you can swallow. With the one-year anniversary of Deltarune chapter 2 coming up soon, Toby Fox has teased something special next week. As far as we know, development on Deltarune continues to go smoothly, with Toby Fox posting as much back in May and stating: “I'm getting more and more people to help recently, I have good feelings about it”, something that’s obviously great to see for fans of Fox’s continued output. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Phasmophobia's custom difficulty update goes live this month, making ghost-hunting more approachable
    Developer of Phasmophobia, Kinetic Games, is no stranger to updates and keeping players in the loop regarding them. The ghost-hunting game has been in Early Access for almost two years now, and it continues to get better each month as Kinetic liaises with its community. That said, Kinetic has listened once more to the thoughts and feedback of players and will soon be introducing a Custom Difficulty update to Phasmophobia. The previous roadmap shared for Phasmophobia didn't go so swimmingly, but not so much so that players were in turmoil over it. Kinetic says in their latest development preview via Steam, "Things didn't exactly go to plan! Originally the VR overhaul was planned to release earlier than April, allowing us to get knee-deep into Custom Difficulty's development. As it took longer, we pushed Custom back a couple of months and gave the community three smaller patches of content to fill the gap in content." Read more  ( 16 min )
    Terraria is the latest gaming icon that might get an official Lego set
    It’s that time again - another video game world is under consideration by the design team at Lego, with a chance to become an official Lego product in stores the world over. This time, it’s a strong fit for brick-built worlds - with Terraria getting the Lego treatment. The Terraria set comes through Lego Ideas, a project ran by the Lego Group that allows fans to submit set designs and ideas to the company. Any set that garners 10,000 supporters in the Lego Ideas community gets sent up to a board of Lego designers and employees, who then assess the set’s suitability for a final release. If they decide to pick it up, it’ll later appear as a real-life set, in real-life shops, no longer just a fan creation, but made official. Making it to a final product from Lego Ideas is a particularly long shot, but the Terraria set has cleared the first major hurdle. In the realm of video games, both Lego Minecraft and Lego Sonic the Hedgehog began life as Lego Ideas submissions. In the case of Minecraft, a one-off Ideas set ultimately led to an entire series of Minecraft sets which are still going strong with new releases to this day. Read more  ( 17 min )
  • Open

    Fedora 39 Looks To Use DNF5 By Default For Better Performance & Improved User Experience
    With Fedora 39 next spring it will likely replace DNF, libdnf, and dnf-automatic with the new DNF5 packaging tool and libdnf5 support library. DNF5 should improve the user experience and deliver better performance for dealing with software management on Fedora Linux...  ( 5 min )
    Following Retbleed, The Combined CPU Security Mitigation Impact For AMD Zen 2 / Ryzen 9 3950X
    Following the July disclosure of the Retbleed CPU security vulnerability affecting older processors and an AMD change made in August, here is a fresh look at the performance impact of the Retbleed mitigations on Linux, including if opting for the IBPB-based Retbleed mitigation, and the accumulated CPU security mitigation impact for Zen 2 with the flagship Ryzen 9 3950X processor.  ( 5 min )
    Richard Stallman Announces GNU C Language Reference Manual
    GNU founder Richard Stallman has recently been working on crafting a GNU C Language introduction and reference manual...  ( 4 min )
    LLVM 15.0 Released With Security Features, Experimental DirectX Back-End, New AMD GPUs
    LLVM 15 is now ready to roll as a big half-year update to this open-source compiler stack. LLVM 15.0, Clang 15.0, and other sub-projects have a lot to show for their summer 2022 accomplishments...  ( 6 min )
    More DRM-Misc-Next Driver Changes Queue Up For Linux 6.1
    DRM-Misc manager Maarten Lankhorst with Intel's open-source graphics engineering team has submitted the latest weekly pull of new feature code to queue in DRM-Next ahead of next month's Linux 6.1 merge window...  ( 5 min )
    Cemu 2.0-1 Brings Many Smaller Linux Improvements For This Wii U Emulator
    Last month saw the Cemu project go open-source and introduce Linux support with Cemu 2.0 for this Nintendo Wii U emulator that has been in development for years. Cemu 2.0-1 is now available with Linux improvements...  ( 4 min )
    OpenWrt 22.03 Released With Updated Firewall, Support For 180+ New Devices
    OpenWrt as the embedded Linux distribution designed to run on wireless routers and other networking devices is out with its 22.03 stable release...  ( 4 min )
    Mesa Preparing Software Fallback For S3TC Texture Compression
    Mesa recently landed BPTC software fallback handling that is a requirement for OpenGL 4.2 support but BPTC is not natively supported by all GPU hardware, particularly on the embedded side. That software emulation support for BPTC is similar to what already has existed within Mesa for the ASTC and ETC formats too. A merge request is pending that also adds S3TC software fallback handling, which helps out some of the smaller, embedded GPU drivers too for getting more games running that are dependent on S3 Texture Compression...  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Cyberpunk 2077 gets a huge update, expansion teaser and fixes the Steam Deck preset
    The Edgerunners Update is out now for Cyberpunk 2077, along with the Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty expansion getting a reveal and a 2023 release date. Some fixes included for Steam Deck finally too.  ( 4 min )
    You can get Crusader Kings III and Just Cause 4 in the new Humble Choice
    The newest monthly bundle is here with Humble Choice and it is once again actually pretty good. Time to go over what to expect from it on Linux desktop and Steam Deck.  ( 4 min )
    Survival game Vintage Story adds 200+ new blocks, lightning, water physics update
    It's pretty staggering just how advanced Vintage Story is becoming as a survival game. It's still relatively unknown but in my eyes it already rivals many popular games and another huge upgrade is out now.  ( 4 min )
    The Wandering Village launches with Linux support on September 14th
    Ready for a different kind of city builder? The Wandering Village is coming into Early Access on September 14th.  ( 4 min )
    Void Scrappers is my new favourite coffee-break game — try the free Prologue
    Void Scrappers Prologue, the new free version of the bigger upcoming Void Scrappers is out now and I had a chance to try it before release and came away very impressed.  ( 4 min )
    Classic pixel-art RTS 'TFC: The Fertile Crescent' gets an online co-op Horde Mode
    TFC: The Fertile Crescent is a really criminally overlooked pixel-art RTS that just got a major upgrade for all players.  ( 4 min )
    Action-RPG collectathon 'Shield Cat' is looking gorgeous in the new demo
    Ready to check out more upcoming games? Shield Cat is a promising action-RPG adventuring collectathon with some wonderful pixel-art that blends in some great lighting and a new demo is out now.  ( 4 min )
    Prodeus cancels the Native Linux version, focusing on Proton compatibility
    Prodeus, the crowdfunded first-person shooter that blends together new and old design styles, will no longer be doing a Native Linux version and instead will ensure it works nicely with Proton.  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Nästa Deltarune-kapitel släpps inte i år
    Toby Fox frestar dock med en jubileumsöverraskning.  ( 6 min )
    Mario + Rabbids och (mycket) Assassin's Creed i lördagens Ubisoft Forward
    Nya Assassin's Creed Mirage i strålkastarljuset.  ( 6 min )
    Första teasern från Cyberpunk 2077-expansionen Phantom Liberty
    Release 2023, med en comebackande Keanu Reeves.  ( 7 min )
    17:00! Se framtiden för Cyberpunk 2077
    Lågoddsare: första glimten av expansionen.  ( 6 min )
    FZ Play - Vi slår ner bopålarna i Disney Dreamlight Valley
    Mirror_Hime möter Långben, Olof och de andra i nysläppta early access-versionen.  ( 6 min )
    Flygsimmen X-Plane 12 släppt - testa demo
    Early access-version ute nu.  ( 6 min )
    Nu kan du betatesta Torchlight: Infinite
    Serien gör ett nytt free to play-försök.  ( 6 min )
    Köp Randy Pitchfords skiti... skrikiga skjortor
    Gearbox-chefen auktionerar bort plagg, pengarna går till stipendium för utvecklare.  ( 6 min )
    System Shock
    Väntan på System Shock 3 är tröstlös. Vi slickar såren med System Shock-remaken.  ( 8 min )
    Fler uppgifter om The Division Heartland läcker
    Ubisoft råkade lägga upp spelets butikssida.  ( 6 min )
    I dag släpps Disney Dreamlight Valley i early access
    Men inte gratis, till skillnad från det färdiga spelet.  ( 6 min )
    Xbox lovar "flera år" av Call of Duty till Playstation
    Men hur många?  ( 7 min )
    Ett AAA-spel med Turtles ska komma nästa år
    Klassiskt beat 'em up eller något annat?  ( 7 min )
    God of War Ragnarök har fått en Rick & Morty-trailer
    Wubalubadubdub, boy.  ( 7 min )
  • Open

    KDE Plasma 5.25.5 Is Out as the Last Update in the Series, Improves Multi-Monitor Support
    KDE Plasma 5.25.5 desktop environment is now available as the last update in the series with various bug fixes and improvements. All users are urged to update as soon as possible! The post KDE Plasma 5.25.5 Is Out as the Last Update in the Series, Improves Multi-Monitor Support appeared first on 9to5Linux - do not reproduce this article without permission. This RSS feed is intended for readers, not scrapers.
  • Open

    Regeringen kovänder – skattesubvention för serverhallar slopas
    Efter skarp kritik från Riksrevisionen och till följd av rådande omständigheter ska teknikjättarnas serverhallar åter börja beskattas.  ( 6 min )
    Geforce RTX 4080 kan få både 12 och 16 GB grafikminne
    Med Nvidias GTC runt hörnet fortsätter Twitter att tissla och tassla om Geforce RTX 4000-serien. Den här gången uppges RTX 4080 lanseras i två upplagor.  ( 6 min )
    Intel: "Användare utan Resizable BAR bör hålla sig till andra grafikkort"
    I en djupdykning med Digital Foundry medger Intel att Kina-lanseringen inte gjorde succé och råder användare med äldre system att söka sig till konkurrenterna.  ( 6 min )
    Snabbkoll: Passar skärmar i 40-tumsklassen vid datorn?
    Skärmstorlekar som tidigare förknippats med TV-apparater blir allt vanligare på skrivbordet. Hur känner du för 40-tummare till datorn?  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Advantages and Disadvantages of Using Linux
    Linux is everywhere and everyone keeps talking about it. And that gives you FOMO. This article will help you decide if Linux is really worth trying.  ( 29 min )
  • Open

    Comic for 2022.09.06 - About To Nut
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )

  • Open

    Intel: Arc A770 GPUs Will Launch “Very Soon”
    Intel details features and capabilities of Arc A770 8GB and 16GB boards, Arc 750 cards.  ( 60 min )
    Best Mini-ITX Cases 2022: Our Picks for Space-Saving PC Builds
    Save some space without sacrificing performance or looks with these compact PC cases.  ( 70 min )
    Best PC Cases 2022: Our Tested Picks for Your New Build
    Here are the best cases for custom PC builds. Our recommendations come from our tests of cooling and noise.  ( 75 min )
    GeForce RTX 3080 20GB GPUs Emerge For Around $575
    A GeForce RTX 3080 20GB from MSI has surfaced, proving Nvidia was at least thinking about selling a 20GB version in the past.  ( 64 min )
    Best External SSDs and Hard Drives of 2022
    We've tested dozens of external hard drives and SSDs to pick out those that offer the best balance of performance, features and price.  ( 75 min )
    Check Out Some of Our Favorite Labor Day Deals: Real Deals
    Happy Labor Day everyone, and we hope you're getting to enjoy the day to the fullest. Today we've had a look around the internet for some of the best Labor Day deals on some of our favorite tech products.  ( 66 min )
    GeForce RTX 4080 May Come In 16GB and 12GB Flavors
    We have seen GeForce models with the same model number but different memory configs before, but we think the lower-end RTX 4080 highlighted today will be an RTX 4070 (Ti) card.  ( 60 min )
    USB 4 Version 2's Secret 120 Gbps Mode Has a Catch
    USB 4 can do even better and support aggregate bandwidth of up to 120 Gbps.  ( 60 min )
    Best CPU Coolers 2022: AIO and Air Coolers
    These are the best air and liquid/AIO CPU coolers for all consumer systems, from small form-factor builds to overclocked big rigs.  ( 71 min )
    Raptor Lake iGPU Catches Up To AMD Vega 10 In OpenGL Benchmark
    It is interesting to see some performance uplift in the iGPU, but it is only about 2 or 3% faster than the UHD Graphics 770 in the Core i9-12900 processors.  ( 60 min )
    Biostar B660M Silver Motherboard Review: Competent and Affordable
    Biostar’s B660M Silver is a well-appointed budget Micro ATX board that costs under $160. You get two PCIe 4.0 x4 M.2 sockets, four SATA ports, a premium audio codec, and a rear IO panel full of USB ports. There is stiff competition around this price, however.  ( 66 min )
    WD Black SN850 (1TB) SSD Now $109, An All-Time Low
    There's a great deal on the WD SN850 1TB NVMe SSD (with Heatsink) for just $109 at Amazon right now. This is one of the best Gen 4 SSDs on the market.  ( 62 min )
  • Open

    Want a fancy box with 15 programmable buttons? Elgato's Stream Deck MK.2 is 30% off
    The Elgato Stream Deck MK.2 is a kind of funny thing, a little plastic box with 15 plastic buttons. Each button has a tiny screen behind it, and when pressed can do any number of things - launching a program, changing to a new scene in a stream, adjusting your media volume, muting a microphone or sending out an alert. It's ideal for automation, giving you an easy way to trigger scripts or shortcuts that speed up the dreary parts of your job or your favourite game, and of course for game streamers it's invaluable. The MK.2 model normally costs £139, but today at Currys you can pick one up for £97 using the code GAMING30. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Pick up a high-spec Samsung 980 Pro 2TB NVMe SSD with heatsink for £184
    The Samsung 980 Pro is one of the fastest NVMe SSDs on the market, making excellent use of the PCIe 4.0 spec, and today a 2TB model has been reduced to £184 on Amazon UK. The usual price for this model is £252, making this a sweet 27% reduction. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Here's 10 minutes of gameplay from Katana Zero's free DLC
    The first gameplay footage of Katana Zero's free DLC expansion has finally sliced its way onto the internet. Developer Askiisoft released a near-ten minute slice of the DLC's first level over the weekend, showing off some of the ultraviolent delights we can expect to see when it eventually comes out. Have a watch of the level in full below (and apologies in advance to Jim, whose birthday wish of escaping any surprise intruders on his special day goes very much unheard). Read more  ( 17 min )
    BioShock games' "quality of life" updates actually break them on the Steam Deck
    BioShock Remastered, BioShock 2 Remastered and BioShock Infinite have all fallen afoul of some questionably titled “quality of life” updates that publishers 2K Games released last week. These updates added a new 2K Launcher to all three BioShocks that appears when booting them up from Steam, but as found by GamingOnLinux, something about this launcher doesn’t take kindly to Linux-based operating systems. Linux-based operating systems like the Steam Deck’s SteamOS. As it happens, then, there's a chance – if you’re trying to play on Valve’s handheld PC – that all these updates will do is swing a bloodied 9-iron into the Deck’s ability to launch the affected games at all. Whoopsie doodle. Read more  ( 17 min )
    New Tales From The Borderlands won't be episodic, says Gearbox
    Back in the mists of time of 2014, the original Tales From The Borderlands followed the classic Telltale episodic template, with a new chapter dropping every three or four months. Gearbox Software's upcoming New Tales From The Borderlands, however, is going to be doing things a bit differently. As our PAX West team found out over the weekend, NuTales will still be split up into an episodic-style chapter structure, according to director of production James Lopez, but you won't have to wait several months before you can play them altogether. Read more  ( 17 min )
    The making of Wildermyth: how two ex-Riot devs and a college grad built the most innovative RPG in years
    A truly dynamic story is a goal game designers have strived toward for decades. Worldwalker Games' Wildermyth gets closer to that goal than most. In this spellbinding RPG, players guide bands of heroes through a lifetime of adventure, embarking on dozens of short, whimsical quests wherein they grow, age, and quite literally evolve, with the potential to transform into walking trees, celestial beings, and anthropomorphised crows. Wildermyth is an inspired example of narrative design, with some nifty tactical combat to boot. But when Nate Austin, his wife Annie, and his brother Doug began developing the game around eight years ago, the weight of emphasis between storytelling and combat was very much the other way around. Read more  ( 21 min )
    The Division: Heartland first details emerge from a hastily erased Ubisoft Store page
    A store page for The Division's upcoming free-to-play looter-shooter spin-off The Division: Heartland went up on the Ubisoft Store yesterday, revealing new details about the game's setting and multiplayer modes. The store page has since been taken down, but not before it was spotted by a few eagle-eyed Twitterers. Seeing as the next Ubisoft Forward showcase is scheduled for this coming Saturday, it’s entirely possible that we’ll be seeing some concrete deets about Heartland then. Read more  ( 17 min )
    The Silent Hill 2 remake rumour train is chugging again thanks to some very blurry images
    Images that allegedly show a Silent Hill 2 remake have been doing the rounds online over the weekend, featuring creepy nurses and the very shadowy back of protagonist James Sunderland’s head. They’re appropriately blurry, considering the series' penchant for mistiness, but still recognisably Silent Hill. Once again, it’s claimed that the game is being developed by Layers Of Fear studio Bloober Team. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Screenshot Saturday Mondays: Shrimp and a Swiss Army plasma rifle
    Every weekend, indie devs show off current work on Twitter's #screenshotsaturday tag. And every Monday, I bring you a selection of these snaps and clips. This week, my eye has been caught by a shrimp breeding game, some lovely places to explore, some bleak places to explore, and a plasma rifle with a surprising number of functions. Read more  ( 17 min )
    RPS@PAX West 2022: Sunday daily round-up
    The weekend is over and our third day of PAX West has come to a close. I feel like I say this every day, but it was another busy day today as we bounced around the PAX show floor. We played some of our favourite games from the whole event and also recorded two incredible interviews you won't wanna miss. Watch our daily round-up of everything we did for more info! Read more  ( 15 min )
    RPS@PAX West 2022: The cast of Team Fortress 2 reminisce about the FPS's lasting legacy
    In an interview opportunity that Liam and I are still reeling from, we had the chance to chat to the cast of Team Fortress 2 about their experiences lending their voices to one of the most iconic FPSs of all time. After watching yesterday's TF2 panel, we were incredibly excited to put our own questions to the TF2 squad. Ellen McLain (the TF2 announcer), Gary Schwartz (Heavy and Demoman), John Patrick Lowrie (Sniper) and Robin Atkin Downes (Medic) answered all our questions including how they each created the voices for the characters and if they would they return for a completely metaphorical release of Team Fortress 3 which - spoilers - was a resounding yes. Watch below for the entire interview. Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    Phasmophobia getting custom difficulty this month, updated roadmap released
    Kinetic Games has released an updated development roadmap for its deliciously spooky ghost hunting sim Phasmophobia, with the game's custom difficulty feature now set to release this month with plenty more on the way. As Kinetic explains in a new Steam post, the team has now revised its early access roadmap for 2022 and beyond to "more accurately represents what we achieved this year, and what we plan to do moving forwards" following a longer-than-expected development period for Phasmophobia's VR rework, which eventually arrived in April. Kinetic has released some smaller updates since then to keep players appropriately terrified but it's all go in September with the advent of Phasmophobia's Custom Difficulty update, which the developers says is "a big one". Read more  ( 16 min )
    This week's Ubisoft Forward digital showcase will "unveil the future" of Assassin's Creed
    This Saturday brings another edition of Ubisoft Forward, showcasing the publisher's roster of upcoming games, and in the run-up to its arrival Ubisoft has shared more on what viewers can expect to see when tuning in, including a look at the future of the Assassin's Creed franchise. As previously announced, Ubisoft Forward gets underway on Twitch, YouTube, and Ubisoft's website this Saturday, 10th September, from 8pm in the UK. Those with a little more time on their hands can start even earlier, with a pre-show scheduled to run from 7.35pm BST, promising news on the latest seasons, characters, and content from Anno 1800, Brawlhalla, For Honor, The Crew 2, and more. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Torchlight: Infinite reimagines the series as a free-to-play game for PC and mobiles
    The Torchlight series is returning - although this time as a free-to-play game for PC, iPhone and Android devices. An early Steam version of the game is available to download now, as part of a closed beta test before a full launch next month, some time in October. (You can request access via its Steam page.) There's a whiff of Diablo Immortal to Torchlight Infinite, which has numerous ways to spend money within the game. Monetisation will include a season pass, monthly pass, auction house and premium currency bundles. Spending and progress will be reset at the end of the current beta, though the amount you spend will then be granted back when the game fully arrives. Read more  ( 15 min )
    DF Direct: What's really happening with Intel Arc graphics?
    This week's DF Direct is somewhat different than the usual show - a while back, Intel approached us, asking to be featured on a future episode to talk about its Arc graphics line. At the same time, Intel Fellow Tom Petersen, having seen our extensive image quality comparisons in our FSR 2.0 God of War video, was also keen to see the firm's own XeSS machine learning-based upscaling technology put through its paces in a similarly rigorous fashion. That work is still ongoing and due later this week, but today I'm pleased to share the DF Direct Intel special, filmed in Berlin last week - not least because it sees Petersen addressing all of the concerns we've had about Arc over the last few months. I'd recommend watching the video through because we've got a lot of ground to cover, kicking…  ( 18 min )
    Sega's Mega Drive Mini 2 retro console full game list revealed
    Sega's Mega Drive Mini 2 retro console is now available to pre-order in Europe, so get in quick if you don't want to miss out. The console will release on 27th October and the included 60 titles from both the Mega Drive and Mega CD consoles have now been fully revealed, including two that were previously unreleased. As reported last month, the console will have a tenth of the supply compared to the previous retro console in North America, so stocks are expected to be limited. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Spider-Man mods adds Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
    There's a mod for Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered on PC that lets you play as the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. It seems that the Turtle brothers aren't satisfied with their own success with Shredder's Revenge have made their way into Spider-Man's territory. Created by SpaceDasher, the mod lets you choose between Leonardo, Raphael, Donatello or Michelangelo to swing around as. Or maybe that should be swim around as? Read more  ( 15 min )
    Fans think Naughty Dog left a clue about its next project in The Last of Us Part 1
    The Last of Us Part 1 only released a few days ago for the PlayStation 5, but fans are already dissecting, and by extension discussing, every inch of its world. One such discussion taking place focuses on a potential new IP from Naughty Dog, that many believe will have a fantasy theme. This all started after several posters with fantasy-like elements were spotted adorning the game's walls. The posters in question, which can be seen below, show images of a Pegasus-like horse, a dragon, and a female warrior: Read more
    Elden Ring mod adds Lord of the Rings' Sauron to the fight
    The Lord of the Rings' primary antagonist Sauron has come to Elden Ring thanks to a new armour mod. The mod comes from MaxTheMiracle, and reskins the player with Sauron's black armour and humanoid figure seen in the likes of Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings film adaptations (but without that imposing height). This mod is still in its early days, but has been released to coincide with Amazon's Rings of Power series. As such, the current weapon moveset used within this mod is borrowed from another mod, as work on it continues behind the scenes. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Perfect Dark not in trouble, Microsoft says, despite Crystal Dynamics' involvement
    Matt Booty, Head of Microsoft Studios, has assured fans that The Initiative's Perfect Dark game is in good shape despite working with Crystal Dynamics. Speaking at PAX West last week, Booty discussed the increased prevalence of multiple developers working together on new games. "How we make games is evolving," said Booty. "The idea of a single team under one roof really doesn't happen that often anymore." Read more  ( 15 min )
    Watch Crash Bandicoot get his groove on in this fan-made mini-game remake
    An upcoming Crash Bandicoot fan game will bring the dancefloor to Wumpa Island in a remake of one of the series' lesser-known mini-games. Crash'N'Dance is being developed by indie dev Fierce the Bandit, who posted a short video of their current progress. The fan-made project is a rhythm game where players must hit button prompts in time to the music. Fake Crash will pop up on the screen sporadically in an attempt to distract you, but if you're successful, Crash will perform his signature boogie and get a shiny crystal. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Bioshock Infinite Steam update adds new launcher, to upset of its community
    A recent "Quality of Life" update for Bioshock Infinite on Steam has added a new launcher, which includes a "Store to purchase new content". This update went live over the weekend, and also added an in-game account linking option. However, despite being labelled as a "quality of life" update, this move by publisher 2K has left some fans unhappy, with several stating the game is now broken. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The Division Heartland details pop up on Ubisoft store
    Details of Heartland, the upcoming free-to-play The Division spin-off, have popped up via Ubisoft's own store. A listing for The Division Heartland is still available, with its client listed as available to download on PC "soon". The store page also hosts various screenshots of the under-wraps shooter, and describes it as a "free-to-play survival-action multiplayer shooter set in small-town Middle America". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Ghostwire: Toyko's upcoming R.E.A.L. VR mod is the best way to experience the game by far
    Ghostwire: Toyko is one of the exceedingly small number of video games that I've been bothered to grab all the trophies for. It wasn't a fun Platinum either as, after about 10 hours in, the game gets rather repetitive and the trophy hunt becomes an absolute mind-numbing grind for collectibles. So why did I do I bother then? You might be thinking. Well, simply put, I absolutely loved the look and the feel of Tango Gameworks' version of Shibuya. The way the rain soaked streets reflect the neon signs is mesmerising to me. The gloriously detailed environments makes it feel like you really are in a real, living city in the moments after its inhabitants were spooky-raptured. It's such a beautiful space to inhabit and as a bit of a Japanophile who recently spent his honeymoon wandering around parts of Shibuya that feature in the game, playing Ghostwire: Tokyo is also a great way to soak up the vibe of the city and indulge in some memories of my trip. But now, thanks to an upcoming mod from master VR modder Luke Ross, I'm able to experience the world of Ghostwire: Tokyo like I was actually there and it's by far my most preferred way to play the game. Want to see what all the fuss is about? You can watch me lose my mind over petting Shiba Inu's in VR in this week's VR Corner (below). Read more  ( 16 min )
    Retro Studios' unreleased Zelda project was "an experiment gone wrong"
    It turns out that Retro Studios' Zelda project progressed to the point where it had working gameplay - but it just wasn't very good. Retro Studios - the developer behind the Metroid Prime series - was long-rumoured to have worked on a canned Zelda game and in 2020 concept art of the project was discovered. Now, YouTube channel Did You Know Gaming has uncovered more information about the project. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Beware, Splatoon 3 story details have leaked online
    Splatoon 3 has already leaked online, including major spoilers for the game's story mode. We won't be posting any spoilers here so if you want to stay spoiler-free before the game's official release, be wary when searching for Splatoon 3 on YouTube or social media. Splatoon 3 will release on 9th September, but leaks were being posted online almost a week before that date. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Assassin's Creed Mirage to recreate Unity's crowds, latest leak suggests
    The next Assassin's Creed game, set in Baghdad, will feature crowds of people on its streets for the first time since the widely-panned Paris-set Unity. That's according to a fresh round of leaked information on the upcoming Assassin's Creed Mirage from well-established Ubisoft leaker j0hnathan, who has now had his Twitter account suspended. Among those details includes the fact that Baghdad will be divided into four separate zones, each with a boss to defeat, but also be surrounded by a desert area, oases and rivers. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Rick and Morty head to the Nine Realms in God of War Ragnarök promo
    In anticipation of God of War Ragnarök's release, a new promo starring Rick and Morty has been revealed. American adult-oriented nighttime cable television channel Adult Swim shared the new ad on its Rick and Morty social feeds. The clip shows eccentric scientist Rick shaving his head and branding himself with Kratos' iconic red facial tattoo. He then proceeds to hand his grandson Morty a toy bow and arrow, before shoving him through a portal to the Nine Realms. Here, Rick gets his hands on Kratos' Leviathan Axe and "other unannounced upgrades" as Morty tries to fend for himself (rather unsuccessfully) in the hostile world he suddenly finds himself in. It ends with Rick finding a boat, informing the overpowered Morty that he will have to row as Rick doesn't want to get his new axe wet. You can watch it for yourself below. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Elden Ring manga turns the game into a farce
    A new Elden Ring manga reimagines the game as a comedy. Or maybe your playthrough was a comedy all along? There's certainly a farcical element to all the constant dying. The manga comes courtesy of Kadokawa - FromSoftware's parent company and a huge publisher of manga. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Jack Move is a brisk cyberpunk JRPG-alike that's out this week
    Jack Move. Jack Move. Here is a phrase that tickles somewhere, deep in the back of the brain, buried under boxes and old coats. Wasn't someone...down for a Jack Move? I want to say William Gibson. One of the early ones - or maybe one of the present-day ones? Googling will have to wait, because here is Jack Move, with a demo out on Steam now and a release planned for the 8th of September. Turns out we're all down for a Jack Move. And I reckon I was right about Gibson, because Jack Move is a cyberpunk JRPG, albeit one with modern sensibilities, which means the pixel-art is smooth and Treasure-textured and the action is implausibly brisk. Straight up: this is a lovely thing. Lovely from the way that you PATCH items rather than use them, to the way that you have stats for Sass and Guts and Grok. Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    PHP 8.2 RC1 Released With Various Fixes & Improvements
    After a series of alpha and beta releases over the past several months, out this past week is the first release candidate of the upcoming PHP 8.2...  ( 4 min )
    Radeon RADV Driver Lands Vulkan Mesh Shader Support
    Being merged a few minutes ago into Mesa 22.3 is the Radeon Vulkan driver "RADV" support for the recently ratified mesh shader extension...  ( 5 min )
    The Still Very Early State Of Vulkan For Blender - No Active Developers Working On It
    While there has been talk and plans for Vulkan API support within Blender, currently there are no active developers working on it and much work remains before it would be ready for end-users...  ( 5 min )
    Linux May Flip On Indirect Branch Tracking By Default (IBT)
    A new patch floated by a Google Chrome OS / Linux kernel engineer would enable support for the Intel-led Indirect Branch Tracking (IBT) by default as part of the standard kernel configuration for this security feature...  ( 4 min )
    Ubuntu Talks Up Its GNOME Dynamic Triple Buffering Support In 22.04/22.10
    Originally carried as a patch against Ubuntu 22.04 for its GNOME 42 desktop and continued to be maintained against GNOME 43 for the upcoming Ubuntu 22.10 is supporting dynamic triple buffering with the Mutter compositor. This has allowed Ubuntu's GNOME desktop environment to perform better for some systems albeit not upstream in GNOME...  ( 5 min )
    OpenMandriva Lx 5.0 ROME "Silver Candidate" Released
    Following the OpenMandriva Lx ROME Technical Preview release from earlier this summer, a "silver candidate" for OpenMandriva Lx 5.0 ROME is now available for testing...  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Löfte: nya Perfect Dark inte i fara
    Microsoft kommer med lugnande besked.  ( 7 min )
    Nämen!? Inför Tokyo Game Show förnyar Konami varumärkesskyddet för Suikoden
    Femman släpptes 2006.  ( 6 min )
    Nightdive reder ut (?) skillnaden mellan remake och remaster
    Jobbar just nu med System Shock-remaken.  ( 7 min )
    Aliens: Dark Descent
    Desperation och paranoia. Det Xcom-lika Aliens-spelet sätter stämningen direkt.  ( 8 min )
    Halo Infinite-bugg låter spelare köra co-op i split-screen
    Spelläget som inte blir av.  ( 6 min )
    Rockstar tackar de 5 101(!) som jobbat med GTA V och GTA Online
    Ännu ett tecken på att GTA VI-avslöjande närmar sig?  ( 7 min )
    Gerda: A Flame in Winter
    O-dejliga danska dilemman.  ( 9 min )
    Nästa Nintendo Direct ryktas inkludera en It Takes Two-utannonsering
    Även om showen inte ens har utannonserats än.  ( 6 min )
    Blizzard drar tillbaka Diablo Immortal-valuta som köpts från tredje part
    Och många spelare är nu skuldsatta i spelet.  ( 7 min )
    The Quarry-utvecklaren Supermassive har börjat jobba på nästa spel
    Och de fortsätter på skräcktemat.  ( 6 min )
    Här är 18 minuter från New Tales from the Borderlands
    Kan Gearbox nå Telltales höjder?  ( 7 min )
    Rykte: Assassin's Creed Mirage siktar på stora folkmassor och en enda stad
    Och kastknivar!  ( 7 min )
  • Open

    Even MORE invites for Steam Deck purchases will start going out now
    You've heard this before right? As of today, Valve will be sending out even more emails each time to invite people to purchase their reserved Steam Deck.  ( 4 min )
    SiNKR 3 is a wonderful end to a clever wordless puzzle game series
    Love puzzle games? Check out the new Native Linux release of SiNKR 3. It's a wordless puzzle game that needs you to hook and pull various objects and it's quite a gem.  ( 5 min )
    The Kubuntu Focus NX is a small and mighty Linux desktop
    The Kubuntu Focus team recently announced the Kubuntu Focus NX, a small but surprisingly mighty little Linux desktop.  ( 4 min )
    JSAUX announce their new Steam Deck Dock with an M.2 SSD slot
    Need more storage space for your Steam Deck when docked up to a TV or monitor? JSAUX have returned with their next-generation Steam Deck Dock and it sounds pretty interesting.  ( 5 min )
    Psychological horror detective adventure Saint Kotar gets a Linux version
    Nearly a whole year after the release, the point and click psychological horror detective adventure game Saint Kotar now has a Native Linux version available.  ( 4 min )
    Scathe is definitely not the FPS experience I was expecting
    Scathe is a brand new FPS from Damage State and Kwalee that seemed interesting from some previews before release. I took a look and did not come away impressed. You could say I'm being scathing of this one.  ( 5 min )
    Various BioShock games get a 2K Launcher calling it a 'Quality of Life Update'
    Apparently now a Quality of Life Update means adding a launcher to existing games and breaking them, if you're 2K that is. Here's how to skip the launcher on BioShock Remastered 1 & 2 and BioShock Infinite.  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Bye bye BoJo: Liz Truss named new UK prime minister
    Can tech hold its own among an overflowing in-tray? Former foreign secretary Liz Truss has been voted in as the UK's next prime minister – at least by about 80,000 Conservative Party members – and will face a barrage of policy decisions. Questions over the cost of living and energy crises will top the agenda, but tech policy also needs her attention.…  ( 5 min )
    E-commerce pros tie the knot in Amazon-themed wedding
    From the department of 'what fresh hell?' Weddings already suck, and the tasteful wedding is becoming ever rarer. If the ceremony is not at a Victorian folly that costs more to book than a normal person's annual salary, you could well be in for a different kind of statement.…  ( 4 min )
    OneWeb takes $229m hit from satellites not returned by Russia
    Launch postponements also a part of the writeoff as company pins hopes on SpaceX OneWeb has taken a $229.2 million hit after it cancelled launches from Russia's Baikonur facility, and a number of its low Earth orbit satellites that were waiting to be sent to space were not returned.…  ( 4 min )
    NATO investigates after criminals claim to be selling its stolen missile plans
    Also, Microsoft’s one-click TikTok trick, a 14-year old Aussie cracks ASD encryption in an hour, and more In brief  NATO officials are investigating after criminals put up some data for sale on dark forums that they claim is "classified" information stolen from European missile maker MBDA.…  ( 8 min )
    NASA's Artemis rocket makers explain that it's a marathon and a sprint
    SLS rocket is a mix of old and new NASA's Space Launch System might look like a mishmash of heritage Space Shuttle parts but it's all new hardware, and the team who built the twin boosters and engines have been talking about the challenges of bringing designs from the 1970s into a lunar future.…  ( 7 min )
    Nadine Dorries promotes 'Brexit rewards' of proposed UK data protection law
    Culture secretary talks up pre-Commons reading as UK waits to hear who new leader will be On the day the UK is set to appoint its new prime minister, digital and culture secretary Nadine Dorries is introducing legislation in Parliament she promises will “drop unnecessary box-ticking and measures stifling British businesses.”…  ( 5 min )
    Open source databases: What are they and why do they matter?
    We trawled through the licensing terms and spoke to the vendors so you don't have to Feature  For developers, there is no debate. The future of the database is open source. A glance at the 2022 Stack Overflow survey of around 70,000 code-wranglers shows nearly all pros use one of the two leading open source RDBMSes, PostgreSQL (46.5 percent) or MySQL (45.7 percent), although they use other systems as well.…  ( 18 min )
    The crime against humanity that is the modern OS desktop, and how to kill it
    Just one big GUI mess Opinion  The sight of a former executive laying into their old company is rarely less than delicious. And when that company is Microsoft, the exec is head of user experience, and the complaint is about the solid slab of sadness that is the Windows 11 Start menu? This calls for not just regular salted popcorn, but truffle-oil popcorn on a silver platter carried in by a butler.…  ( 6 min )
    Microsoft: The deadline to get off Basic Auth is approaching
    Exchange Online face Halloween deadline Don't say you weren't warned.…  ( 6 min )
    Microsoft mistakenly rated Chromium, Electron, as malware
    Windows Defender update fixed the mess after a weekend of false positive weirdness Microsoft appears to have fixed a problem that saw its Defender antivirus program identify apps based on the Chromium browser engine and/or Electron JavaScript framework as malware, and suggest users remove them.…  ( 4 min )
    Salesperson's tech dream delivered by ill-equipped consultant who charged for the inevitable fix
    ‘I had a sharp new suit and a misplaced sense of confidence’ – and made a costly mistake Before you shell out big bucks to engage the services of consultants, perhaps consider this week’s instalment of Who, Me? and the adventures of a reader we’ll call “Norman” for the duration of this tale.…  ( 5 min )
    Google tests alternative payment methods in Play store
    Pilot scheme running in Europe, APAC, sees ad giant still take a four percent cut Google has started a test of alternative payment systems in its Play store.…  ( 4 min )
    Cloudflare stops services to ‘revolting’ far right hate site
    Escalation of targeted threats is an ‘emergency’ that required ‘dangerous’ decision ‘we are not comfortable with’, says CEO Cloudflare has decided to stop providing its services to Kiwi Farms, just days after defending the site’s eligibility for its services.…  ( 5 min )
    China orders tech companies to 'improve traceability' of users to control 'rumours and false information'
    PLUS: Australia mints a physical crypto-coin; Alibaba Cloud claims world's biggest DC; India’s space airbags; and more China will conduct a three month blitz to cleanse the local internet of "rumors and false information".…  ( 7 min )
  • Open

    Microsoft Studios head wants to show Fable off, but the team isn't ready yet
    You aren't alone in wanting a new Fable trailer, as Microsoft Studios head Matt Booty wants to show it off, but Playground Games is understandably not quite ready yet. The new Fable was revealed back in 2020, but as with many games these days, it was a cinematic trailer, so no gameplay to speak of. Who knows where it might be in development, but based on what Booty has said recently on a panel at PAX West, it still needs some more time in the metaphorical oven. "Part of my job is giving air cover to the team," Booty explained. "They don't want to show stuff early before it's ready to go, but if there's one game where that's kind of flipped around, where every time I see something I say, 'We should show this', it's Fable. Because there's a lot of cool stuff." Read more  ( 16 min )
    If Xbox wants an Xbox Game Pass great, The Initiative's Perfect Dark must avoid the series' past mistakes
    Rare’s legendary N64 first-person shooter, Goldeneye, marked its 25th anniversary last month. However, at the risk of raising blood pressure worldwide, I’ll dare to say that it’s not the jewel in the British developer’s FPS crown. That accolade goes to its spiritual successor: Perfect Dark. With the announcement of a series reboot at The Game Awards in 2020, Microsoft’s newest studio, The Initiative, has been given the momentous task of bringing the franchise to modern audiences, with a little help from Tomb Raider industry veterans Crystal Dynamics. Ignoring for a moment that The Initiative sounds concernedly like one of the shady organisations that Joanna Dark would be taking down, the new triple-A studio has its work cut out in creating a debut title that manages to deliver the nostalgia that long-time series fans will want, as well as enough modernity to satisfy new players — something that Rare failed to do with Perfect Dark Zero back in 2005. If they want to be in with a shot of satisfying both audiences, they’ll need to learn from Rare’s mistakes. Firstly, we need a cool-as-heck story. Very little has been shared about the reboot so far, but the cinematic trailer confirms the theme of ecological disaster. We see Earth from space, rife with storms, fires, and floods. We’re told of corporations offering “solutions”, but series fans will know that corporations have long played complex roles in Perfect Dark’s lore. We also know by the end of the trailer that dataDyne is still a featured antagonist, as the camera pans across dead soldiers to show Joanna standing atop a dataDyne super-structure, looking out over a storm ravaging the Great Pyramids. Setting itself deeply within the fictional side of sci-fi, Perfect Dark has always played with the idea of an alternative future. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Fantasy art in Last of Us Part 1 sparks speculation of a new Naughty Dog IP
    The Last of Us Part 1 is out and firmly in the hands of players across the world. A great overhaul of an already brilliant game (as per our review), many are jumping in and scouring the world in Joel’s shoes once again. However, a secret recently found in this new version of the Naughty Dog 3rd person classic has some curious about the next big IP from the studio. In the new game, players can track down and take a look at pin boards inside a pitch-black building. With the help of a flashlight, you can see several pieces of fantastical art featuring dragons, a variety of fantasy characters, and other mystical creatures and settings. Now, there’s been no word on what the team at Naughty Dog are working on next, aside from the Last of Us multiplayer title they teased earlier this year. However, the studio has a history if littering their games with hints towards future titles. Uncharted 3 famously featured an easter egg pointing towards The Last of Us before its official reveal, so the likelihood that this is a similar situation isn’t nil. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Halo Infinite players find a sneaky way to play split-screen co-op through a menu glitch
    Even though split-screen co-op has been cancelled for Halo Infinite, players have worked out a way that lets them do it anyway. Last week, 343 Industries provided a roadmap for Halo Infinite that promised players the Forge and Campaign co-op would be coming in November. Only downside is that split-screen co-op had been cancelled in the process, obviously leaving some players that were hoping to live out their youth once more disappointed. But it seems that some players have found a bit of a workaround thanks to a menu glitch. As spotted by Eurogamer, French Halo community Halo Creation shared a video that shows a menu glitch that allows you to play the game in split-screen co-op. The Twitter account for the community has shared a helpful video of the glitch in action, which was discovered by Halo player Alexis B., and all the steps you need to follow. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Splatoon 3 gameplay is already online as street dates are broken
    The game might not be out until the end of the week, but plenty of Splatoon 3 gameplay is already appearing online. Street dates of games can often be broken by a day or so, whether it comes to a delivery service just getting a package somewhere early, or a store being a bit cheeky and letting a friend buy a copy a day early. Unfortunately for Nintendo, a tonne of gameplay has already leaked online just under a week before the game is out week, September 9. As spotted by Kotaku, gameplay has been appearing all over the Splatoon subreddit, though the subreddit is removing any posts that shows anything that hasn't been previously revealed in an official capacity, considering that it would technically be a spoiler. This is the subreddit's general rule for spoilers anyway, so if you're worried about visiting the subreddit post-release, there shouldn't be any spoilers to be found. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Metroid Prime developer's cancelled Zelda game was apparently "an experiment gone wrong"
    Some new details have emerged on Retro Studios' cancelled Zelda game that would have starred Sheik as the main character. Retro Studios is best known for the Metroid Prime series these days, but did you know that at one point in time it was working on a Zelda game that would have put Sheik in the leading role? Did You Know Gaming knows, and it has recently put out a video spoke with one of the programmers that worked on the project. Concept art for the game was released back in 2020, with the game supposedly intending to have more of a darker tone that would tell an origin story of the Master Sword, set in a timeline where Link fails to beat Ganon in Ocarina of Time. As a result of that artwork being released, programmer Paul Tozour was willing to talk about it, as well as an anonymous source, though it didn't sound like a great game. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Quarry’s studio director says next game is in development, “still very much classic horror”
    Speaking with VGC, studio director at Supermassive Games Will Byles disclosed that the studio's next big horror title is already in development. Supermassive Games first became renowned for Until Dawn, even winning a BAFTA award for the narrative-driven slasher game. Then came The Dark Pictures Anthology, a series of smaller, episodic narrative horror tales for players to embark on. Most recently, however, was The Quarry; another full-blown teen slasher in the form of a cinematic game, well worth the 4/5 we gave it in our review. Read more  ( 16 min )
    World of Warcraft Classic is currently plagued... with massive queue times
    The lead up to World of Warcraft’s Wrath of the Lich King Classic launch is well underway, with pre-patch servers up and running for close to a week now. This, in theory, lets players jump in and gear up a new character in preparation for our adventure to the frozen north, but humongous queue times across several servers have made this difficult for some players to get their adventure started in earnest. This issue is affecting two types of servers present in Classic WoW. The first are the long-standing servers that have maintained a large population since Classic first launched back in 2019, like Grobbulus in the EU region. However, newly-created Fresh servers are also suffering. These new servers allow everyone to start playing totally empty-handed with others, without inflated economies or pre-existing fortunes muddying things. Frustration and a healthy amount of joking around the topic can be found in heaps. Looking at the Classic WoW Reddit, numerous posts from players expressing their doomer outlook on the situation are present, listing out exorbitant queue times for their chosen servers, as well as some taking the plunge into less popular servers in order to kick their levelling journey into gear. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Elden Ring's Ancestor Spirit bosses are much more complex and horrifying than we realised
    Elden Ring is full of hidden areas, obscure bosses, and entire communities you may not get to see if you don't venture too far off the beaten path. One of the more unique are the Ancestral Followers, who can be found deep underground in the Siofra River Bank. The Followers worship the Ancestor Spirits, and can be seen gathering around its remains performing their rites. By following a simple mini-game, you can travel to the realm of the Ancestor Spirit and take it on in a boss fight. All that is well and good, but the fight itself plays quite differently from all the other fights in Elden Ring. Most players who fought the Ancestor Spirit bosses in the game felt that they got a slightly different experience from the rest. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Silent Hill 2 Remake screenshots leak, reportedly from Bloober Team's internal pitch for the game
    Over the weekend, VGC reporter Andrew Marmo took to Twitter to share some images that caused many a Silent Hill fan to be on the edge of their seat once again. The images are reportedly shots - albeit very poor-quality ones - of an upcoming Silent Hill 2 remake from Bloober Team. Now, we’re aware that Bloober Team are working with Konami given that the pair entered a partnership during summer last year. Just a month following that announcement, rumours began to emerge that Bloober Team was working on a new Silent Hill title. Bloober’s CMO, Tomasz Galikowski, took part in an interview with IGN to clear the rumours up. Although, he ultimately left fans with more questions. The CMO told IGN that Bloober had applied for two projects with Konami, respectively codenamed Dum Spiro and Black. Read more  ( 17 min )
  • Open

    In New Zealand, conservation is buoyed by Indigenous knowledge
    Blending Māori knowledge into federally funded crayfish research makes for better science.  ( 6 min )
    Review: Lenovo’s ThinkPad Z13 is a bit weird, but Ryzen 6000 is fantastic
    The best ThinkPad qualities are sadly diluted, but performance is excellent.  ( 6 min )
    Celibacy has surprising evolutionary advantages, according to new research
    A study on the consequences of becoming a monk related to evolutionary fitness.  ( 7 min )
  • Open

    Testpilot: Komplett Khameleon 12i Slim
    Testpiloten Björn Endre tar sig an Komplett Khameleon 12i Slim, en bärbar dator som kombinerar en tunn design med utmärkta komponenter.  ( 14 min )
    Seasonic förbereder nätaggregat med ATX 3.0 och 12VHPWR-kontakt
    Inför höstens grafikkortlanseringar laddar Seasonic upp med den nya nätaggregatsserien Vertex, vilken har en 16-pins 12VHPWR-kontakt som kan leverera upp till 600 W.  ( 6 min )
    Japansk minister inleder kamp mot disketter
    Efter misslyckat försök att fimpa myndigheters faxmaskiner utropar digitaliseringsminstern krig mot disketter i offentlig sektor.  ( 6 min )
    Reservdelar till telefoner kan bli EU-krav
    I EU-kommissionens senaste förslag återfinns krav på tillverkare att erbjuda 15 olika reservdelar i upp till 5 år. Därtill ställs högre krav på batterier.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Comic for 2022.09.05 - Genie Bong
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )
  • Open

    Artemis Quote
    No content preview  ( 1 min )

  • Open

    RPS@PAX West 2022: We chat with Brainwash Gang about their chaotic deck-building FPS Friends Vs Friends
    It's the dawn of day three here at PAX West, and what better way to wake us up than play the incredibly chaotic demo build of Friends VS Friends. We loved the trailer from Gamescom and Liam even chose it for his bestest pick in our Gamescom round-up video, so our expectations were high, and after playing a quick match at the Raw Fury booth, Brainwash Gang's blood-pumping deck-building FPS shot straight to the top of our favourite things we've seen here at PAX so far. If you've not heard of Friends VS Friends, check out the game's trailer first (its incredibly slick animation is super cool, highly reccomended for your peepers) then watch our interview with Brainwash Gang developer Edu Verz who talked all about the game's development. Watch it below: Read more  ( 16 min )
    RPS@PAX West 2022: Saturday daily round-up
    It's been one heck of a busy day for team RPS on day two of PAX West. It's now the weekend so the show floor was significantly busier, but not enough to keep us from getting our mitts on some games. That's right, we actually played some games today! Have a click on the video below were we break down the day's activities and also to see us get booted out from the show floor when it closed at 7. Here's today's daily round-up: Read more  ( 15 min )
    RPS@PAX West 2022: Ron Gilbert tells us about the pirate shenanigans in Return to Monkey Island
    Today's PAX West interview is with the one and only Ron Gilbert, series creator of the iconic point-and-click adventure series, Monkey Island. We are big fans of Monkey Island here at RPS, so after watching him guest speak on the Adventure Games PAX panel today, we got a chance to chinwag with Gilbert and to chat about his upcoming comeback to the series with Return to Monkey Island. Gilbert was lovely enough to tell us all about the next game in the Monkey Island saga - what it was like to return to Monkey Island's world after so long, what we can expect from the puzzles, and snippets of the game's story. Watch below to see the interview in its entirety and make sure you watch to the end to see my impression of a pirate - you won't wanna miss that. Read more  ( 16 min )
    RPS@PAX West 2022: Hands-on with Souls-like fairytale Lies of P
    It's day two of PAX West and to kick off our second day of game events and demos we got hands-on with a build of Neowiz's Pinocchio RPG, Lies of P. The gameplay demo caused quite a stir when it was at Gamescom earlier this year, so we made it one of our priorities to check it out here in Seattle. Neowiz are not actually at PAX so there wasn't anyone on the team to give us some behind-the-scenes info, but I got stuck into the demo for a solid 30 minutes, brawling with the game's angry robot lads that roamed the city's blood-washed cobbled streets. Overall, I had a great time with the demo. Yes, it is incredibly similar to Bloodborne in both its combat and environments but there are plenty of other elements that steer it away from FromSoftware's horror-filled gothic RPG. If you want more details instead of that short summary then check out our video below where I talk about my time with the build, and about having my arse kicked by giant mechanical automatons. Enjoy! Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    Linux 6.0-rc4 Released With Various Driver Fixes
    Linus Torvalds just released the fourth weekly release candidate of Linux 6.0 in time for some US Labor Day holiday weekend testing...  ( 4 min )
    Linux 6.1 Default Kernel Config To Warn At Boot Of W+X Mappings
    A change queued up as part of the "x86/mm" TIP changes expected to land for Linux 6.1 will now have the default kernel configuration warn at kernel boot time around any W+X mappings that pose a security risk...  ( 5 min )
    GNOME Shell & Mutter 43 Release Candidates Bring Last Minute Changes
    The release candidates are out today for the GNOME Shell and Mutter updates ahead of this month's GNOME 43 desktop debut...  ( 5 min )
    Mesa RADV Driver Adds Radeon Raytracing Analyzer Support
    Mesa's Radeon Vulkan driver "RADV" has added support for compatibility with GPUOpen's Radeon Raytracing Analyzer...  ( 5 min )
    KDE's Kaidan Messaging App Adding Encrypted Audio/Video Calls
    KDE's Kaidan app has been in development for a number of years now as a Jabber/XMPP chat client built around Kirigami and Qt Quick. Kaidan has been under active development and formally became a KDE project in 2019. It's newest ambition is now working out encrypted audio and video calls...  ( 4 min )
    GravityMark 1.70 Released With VK_EXT_mesh_shader, Vulkan ReBAR Support
    GravityMark 1.70 has been released as the multi-API graphics benchmark developed by Tellusim Technologies that was started by one of the former Unigine engine developers...  ( 5 min )
    It's Past Time To Stop Using egrep & fgrep Commands, Per GNU grep 3.8
    GNU Grep 3.8 was released today for this commonly-used command-line utility for search plain text data. With the GNU Grep 3.8 it's now made more clear that if you are still relying on the egrep and fgrep commands, it's past due for switching to just grep with the appropriate command-line arguments...  ( 5 min )
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    Nyhetsquiz vecka 35 2022: AMD Ryzen 7000 och skärmar
    Böjbara skärmar och färska processorer är de största händelserna när startskottet för teknikhösten 2022 ljuder. Sätter du full pott?  ( 5 min )
    Specifikationer för Core 13000 "Raptor Lake" hittar ut på webben
    Turbofrekvenser och andra specifikationer trängs i de tabeller som Wccftech nu publicerar, som i mångt och mycket återupprepar tidigare rykten.  ( 6 min )
    Geforce RTX 4080 i referensutförande skymtas
    Founder's Edition-versionen av Geforce RTX 3000 kan göra återbesök i aningen biffigare utförande, när RTX 4000-serien debuterar.  ( 6 min )
    Söndagsmatiné: Om Microsofts misslyckade telefonsatsning
    Windows Phone är officiellt död och begraven, men sett till mjuk- och hårdvara var det egentligen inga fel på Microsofts plattform. Söndagsvideon sammanfattar vad som gick snett.  ( 5 min )
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    GeForce RTX 3090 Super With Black Cooler Smiles For The Camera
    The Chinese forum poster shared an image of the GeForce RTX 3090 Super alongside a GPU-Z info page which reports the card as a GeForce RTX 3090 Ti.  ( 59 min )
    Core i9-13900K Outpaces Core i9-12900K In New Benchmarks
    Chinese content creator pitched Intel's upcoming Core i9-13900K engineering sample (ES) against a Core i9-12900K.  ( 63 min )
    AMD vs Intel: Which CPUs Are Better in 2022?
    We wade into the endless debate: Who makes the best CPU, AMD or Intel? Here's the blow-by-blow in ten categories.  ( 95 min )
    RAM Benchmark Hierarchy: Fastest DDR5, DDR4 Memory Kits for AMD and Intel
    Our RAM benchmark hierarchy ranks memory kits of all frequencies and capacities for any budget.  ( 69 min )
    Ssupd Meshroom S Review: Compact Breeze Box
    On paper, the Ssupd Meshroom S looks like the most versatile SFF case ever. But it’s expensive at $160, and complicated to build in if you veer from a traditional ITX layout.  ( 67 min )
    Wuque Studio Promise87 Review: Good Enough to Propose With
    The Promise87 is unique and excellent. It doesn’t come cheap and lacks backlighting that could make it even better, but Wuque has delivered an excellent boutique typing option for keyboard enthusiasts.  ( 74 min )
    Best Gaming Laptop Deals 2022
    Here are the gaming laptop deals we've seen.  ( 63 min )
    Best Tech and PC Hardware Deals for Labor Day 2022
    Whether you're looking for PC components, peripherals or prebuilt systems, these are the best deals on tech.  ( 70 min )
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    Konami renews its Suikoden trademark
    Konami's much-talked about "unannounced game" could be a new Suikoden title. A renewed trademark for the game – filed back in July, but only recently spotted – has popped up in Mexico, leading some to speculate that if Konami's upcoming TGS spot doesn't involve Castlevania, Metal Geat Solid, or Silent Hill, then it just may be about a new installment of the classic RPG series. The filing – spotted by posters on Reddit and shared at ResetEra – tells us that the filing was made at the end of July and… well, not much else, actually. But it's certainly coincidental timing, isn't it, particularly as the last main Suikoden title released way back in 2006. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Halo Infinite players find a way to add split-screen co-op
    Earlier this week, 343 Industries confirmed that split-screen local co-op in Halo Infinite has been cancelled outright - so players are now doing it themselves. "In order to improve and accelerate ongoing live service development - and to better address player feedback and quality of life updates - we have reallocated studio resources and are no longer working on local campaign split-screen co-op," 343 said at the time, dashing the hopes of players who'd been patiently waiting to couch co-op the campaign with pals. Now, however, it seems that players have found a menu glitch that permits them to add up to three additional local co-op players to their system; all you need is an Xbox Series S or X and a pal online, and this helpful walkthrough. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Wizards of the Coast apologises for "offensive" "racial stereotypes" in Dungeons & Dragons
    Wizards of the Coast has apologised for a Dungeons & Dragons update that included "offensive material" and racial stereotypes about a race called Hadozee. The company said it had "failed you, our players and our fans", would remove the offensive material "effective immediately", and stated that it was "truly sorry". "We wanted to acknowledge and own the inclusion of offensive material within our recent Spelljammer: Adventures in Space content. We failed you, our players and our fans, and we are truly sorry," the company said in a statement. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Acclaimed League of Legends animated show Arcane wins an Emmy for Outstanding Animated Program
    Fan-favourite League of Legends animated spin-off Arcane has won an Emmy for Outstanding Animated Program. The show beat The Simpsons, Rick and Morty, What If…?, and Bob's Burgers to secure the award. It is the first streaming series to win in that category. "Honoured doesn’t even begin to describe how we feel about winning the Emmy for Outstanding Animated Program," the show's official Twitter account posted earlier today. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Can the last-gen consoles handle Saints Row?
    I've spent the last week playing Saints Row on last-gen PS4 and Xbox One systems - and honestly? It's really not that bad. The fundamental technological issues remain: the glaring shadow pop-in is back - and actually a bit worse here. The buggy NPC animations and physics return too. Of course, the 60fps target of the PS5 and Series X versions gives way to something worse - a sub-40fps frame-rate or even sub-30 in stress-test scenarios. Performance is still unlocked too, when a 30fps cap really would have made a positive difference, but I went into this one with low expectations, which the last-gen versions comfortably exceed. Similar to Xbox Series S, the wealth of performance mode variations seen in the Series X and PS5 releases are gone. There are no graphics toggles of any kind. On top of that, ray tracing features are absent, of course, but that's fine. There seem to be fixed pixel counts on all systems with no obvious dynamic resolution scaling, but what is interesting is how the HUD overlay actually does seem to change res. It's very, very odd. In-game DRS can't be entirely ruled out, but the game looks consistent in terms of image quality, with only the flickering HUD giving any sense of a resolution change. Looking at the qualities of the last-gen versions, you'd expect Xbox One X to deliver the best rendition of the game - but that's only partly true here. At least in image quality, you're getting a very decent turn-out here at a native 2560x1440, up from the less than stellar 1080p on PlayStation 4 Pro. The One X's 1440p also trumps Series S's full HD output - but quality settings are dialled back (particularly in terms of foliage density) and the unlocked performance level is actually worse than the PS4 Pro experience. With that being the case, there's no real 'winner' here in terms of the last-gen machines as while the One X looks significantly cleaner, frame-rates can hit a 24fps nadir - Pro is smoother overall, if far from the smooth and consistent in its delivery. Read more  ( 18 min )
    The Mortuary Assistant is getting a "companion piece" movie adaptation
    The Mortuary Assistant is the latest video game to be getting the silver screen treatment. The indie horror - which has been a huge hit since it launched at the beginning of August - was reportedly plucked for an adaptation before the full game released earlier this month. Director Jeremiah Kipp says the film will be a "companion piece" to the game, and Kipp hopes to "retain the minimalist setting in and around the mortuary, the fascination with the process of embalming, and the nerve-shredding terror of the gameplay". Read more  ( 16 min )
    Silent Hill 2 Remake screenshots allegedly leak online
    Another day, another alleged Silent Hill leak. This one purports to be of Bloober Team's alleged Silent Hill 2 remake. They're incredibly small and incredibly bad quality, which means they're impossible to confirm either way with any credible veracity, but the poster shared the images with the legend: "First leaked image of Silent Hill 2 Remake supposedly developed by Bloober Team". As for what they show? We seem to be looking at a third-person POV with the camera behind the left shoulder rather than a fixed angle. The third is the most compelling - it appears to be a bubble head nurse and reminds me of Brookhaven Hospital, when the nurse jumps out from near the elevator - whereas the top is reminiscent of the leaked concept art images we saw a few months back. Read more  ( 16 min )
    These stunning Elden Ring art books are releasing in November - but only in Japan
    An official Elden Ring art book is on the way and it's so detailed, you'll have to buy it as two separate 400-page volumes. While currently only available to pre-order in Japan – sorry; we'll let you know if and when it becomes available in Europe and beyond – the collection is currently up for sale on Amazon.co.jp, with each book priced at ¥4400 - that's approximately £27 or £55 for the pair. According to Famitsu (thanks, PC Gamer), a collector's edition which includes both books and a framed Godfrey print is also available for ¥17,600, which is £108. It all comes in a "special three-sided box". Read more  ( 16 min )
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    Have a million bucks to spare? You could buy around 2400 different consoles on eBay right now
    If you have a spare cool mill laying around somewhere, and fancy upping your console collection, there's an eBay listing you might want to check out. With the world of video games offering a fair number of rare collectibles due to limited prints of cartridges, or certain consoles and peripherals not doing well enough to warrant much production of them, there's a lot of collectors in turn who like to build personal libraries. And recently, an eBay listing (spotted by Consolevariations.com) shows a pretty impressive collection of roughly 2400 different consoles. And all the seller wants for it is €984,000, which is about a million US dollars, or £850,000. The auction looks legitimately impressive. Images show a Japanese and (presumably) European version of the Pokemon themed N64, a deliciously burnt orange GameCube, a PSP Go, and so much more. Seriuosly, it is a ridiculuosly large collection that honestly could be worth the asking price. The user in question, kariaure, has even shared videos of their collection on their YouTube channel, with an extensive range of Sega consoles, Game Boys, and more shown off. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Lady Gaga might be appearing in Fortnite, if a leak is to be believed
    It looks like the next music act to possibly have a collaboration with Fortnite is none other than Lady Gaga. According Fortnite Twitter account and leaker FNLeaksAndInfo, "a new collaborative emote" was added with a recent update called "Jug Band," and when four players come together to perform it, a song plays that sounds very similar to Lady Gaga's song Poker Face, as reported by GameSpot. FNLeaksAndInfo then posted a follow-up tweet sharing the audio in question, and yeah, it sure does sound like Poker Face, although more of a southern American, country bumpkin take on the pop song rather than the original. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Elden Ring now has an official comedy manga, with cheeks on display right from the start
    Elden Ring has received an official manga adaptation, only it's more of a comedy manga than you might expect. If you didn't know, Elden Ring is a very funny game. How could it not be, with the endless number of ridiculous ways you could die. But the tone of everything else is generally pretty serious. That's what makes the announcement of an official comedy Elden Ring manga a little bit of a surprise, even if it is a welcome one. The manga is being hosted on ComicWalker where you can already read the first two chapters for free, and has art from Nikiichi Tobita, with the story obviously adapted from Elden Ring itself. It starts much the same as the game's opening slideshow does, with lovingly rendered drawings based on the original art. But from the first proper page, you'll be met with a surprise: ass. Read more
    Prey director says he didn't want to call it that, but Bethesda insisted it should be
    According to Prey director Raphaël Colantonio, Arkane Studios was forced by Bethesda to use the name, even though him not wanting to. If you haven't heard of Prey, first released in 2017, that's not particularly surprising, as it didn't do very well (though it is one of Arkane's best games). There was also a game released in 2006 also called Prey, made by Human Head Studios, which Bethesda owns the IP rights to. And so despite the more recent title having nothing to do with the original, it uses the name, and according to a recent interview with Prey 2017's director, it wasn't anyone at Arkane's decision to use the name. "Calling Prey Prey, that was very very hurtful to me. I did not want to call this game Prey, and I had to say I wanted to anyway in front of journalists," Colantonio said on the AIAS Game Maker's Notebook podcast (thanks, Kotaku). "There is a bit of the artistic, the creative side that is insulted when you tell this artist: 'You know your game? It's going to be called Prey.' And you go like, 'I don't think it should. I think it's a mistake.'" Read more  ( 16 min )
    Diablo Immortal players are finding themselves with big in-game orb debt
    Diablo Immortal players are finding themselves with big in-game debts after purchasing orbs from third-party sites. As spotted by PCGamesN, players are reporting that they are being left with massive in-game debts after purchasing Eternal Orbs, one of the primary currencies in Diablo Immortal, through third-party websites. These orbs are being supposedly revoked by Blizzard, likely due to the fact that orbs cost real-world money. A number of different posts on Diablo Immortal's subreddit are making the claim, saying that they own massive amounts of orbs in the game to make up for what they haven't paid for in game. It can cost £0.89 for 60 orbs, going up to as much as £89.99 for 7200 orbs. Whereas one post notes that third-party sites are selling 7200 orbs for as little as roughly £8.69 ($10). Read more  ( 16 min )
    Call of Duty will be on PlayStation for "several more years" beyond current deal, says Phil Spencer
    According to a recent report, Microsoft plans to keep Call of Duty on PlayStation for "several more years" past the marketing deal the latter currently has with Activision. This comes from The Verge, which recently received a statement from head of Xbox Phil Spencer. "In January, we provided a signed agreement to Sony to guarantee Call of Duty on PlayStation, with feature and content parity, for at least several more years beyond the current Sony contract, an offer that goes well beyond typical gaming industry agreements," wrote Spencer in the statement. It had already been noted that the next three Call of Duty games would launch on PlayStation, which obviously includes the upcoming Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. Presuming that Activision keeps up the yearly releases of the series, that means there will be Call of Duty games on PlayStation until at least 2024, and now, further beyond that. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Pokémon Company sues Chinese mobile game company over intellectual property infringement
    The Pokémon Company is suing multiple Chinese mobile game operators over a game that allegedly looks a bit too much like Pokémon, Pocket Monster Reissue. As reported by South China Morning Post (thanks, GamesIndustry.biz), The Pokémon Company is taking legal action against six Chinese companies over copyright infringement and unfair competition behaviour, due to some striking similarities between Pokémon and Pocket Monster Reissue, also known as Koudaiyaoguai Fuke. Apparently the six companies in question have been running the game since 2015, based on a stock exchange filing from Jiangyin Zhongnan Heavy Industries Co, one of the defendants. In turn, The Pokémon Company has put in a request at the Shenzhen Intermediate People's Court looking to have an order placed against the six companies to prevent them from working on Pocket Monster Reissue. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Splitgate development coming to an end as devs move to an equally portal filled follow-up
    Earlier this week, Splitgate developer 1047 Games announced that development on the game would cease as it shifts over to an Unreal Engine 5 follow-up title. The breakout hit that mixed Halo and Portal will no longer have any feature updates, but while this marks the end of one game, it also marks the start of another. In a statement provided on Twitter, 1047 Games explained its decision to stop development on Splitgate, while also reassuring fans that its next game will also be a shooter with portals. "After careful consideration and much deliberation the 1047 Games team has determined that in order to build the game fans deserve - and to build it in a way that isn't trying to retrofit and live operate an existing product - we are ending feature development of Splitgate," reads the announcement. Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    Idag var det 24 år sedan Snake infiltrerade Shadow Moses
    För 24 år sedan släpptes Metal Gear Solid i Japan.  ( 7 min )
    Turtles skapare Kevin Eastman säger att inte ens han klarade damm-banan i NES-versionen
    What were they thinking!!  ( 7 min )
    Two Point Campus har nått 1 miljon spelare efter endast 2 veckor
    Stark terminsstart för Segas Universitet.  ( 7 min )
  • Open

    How sustainable are fake meats?
    Checking whether plant-based burgers may have lighter environmental footprints.  ( 5 min )
    Examining the game industry’s hidden impacts on climate change
    Researcher Ben Abraham lays out how the game industry can lessen its carbon footprint.  ( 5 min )
    Years after shuttle, NASA rediscovers the perils of liquid hydrogen
    "Every time we saw a leak, it pretty quickly exceeded our flammability limits."  ( 8 min )
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    NASA sees our space future as both government and privately run
    Top official spells out simply why America is going back to the Moon Interview  "There is no SpaceX without NASA," Thomas Zurbuchen, an associate administrator at the US space agency's Science Mission Directorate, told The Register this week as a Falcon 9 lurked in the background at Cape Canaveral.…  ( 5 min )
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    Comic for 2022.09.04 - Nerf Gun Fight
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )
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    Junichi Uekawa: September.
    September. Digging into why my apt-get doesn't complete.

  • Open

    Intel's Xeon Emerald Rapids CPUs Could Wield Up To 64 Cores
    Hardware leaker shares the alleged specifications for Intel's Emerald Rapids Xeon processors.  ( 60 min )
    How to Set Up a Headless Raspberry Pi, Without Ever Attaching a Monitor
    By tweaking a few settings in Raspberry Pi imager, you can control your Pi over the network and will never need a screen.  ( 66 min )
    Crucial P3 SSD Review: Solid Secondary SSD
    The Crucial P3 SSD is an efficient budget drive with capacity to spare.  ( 66 min )
    DeepCool AK500 Review: Big Air, Incredible Value
    DeepCool delivers yet another impressive air cooler with its AK500. Our tests show it can handle thermal demands over 200W while remaining quiet.  ( 67 min )
    Logitech G705 Review: Cute, clicky, contoured
    The Logitech G705 is a small, contoured wireless gaming mouse that performs well but doesn’t stand out.  ( 67 min )
    How to Create Web Apps with Python, HTML and Thonny
    Get the latest news, stocks, jokes using RSS feeds and just a little Python. We use the latest version of Thonny to write our own, custom web app.  ( 63 min )
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    All the best Labor Day tech deals we can find this weekend
    Dealmaster includes MacBook Pros, OLED TVs, AirPods Max, video games freebies, and more.  ( 8 min )
    Liveblog: All the news from Apple’s “Far Out” event
    Tune in at 1 pm EST on September 7, 2022, to see what's next from Apple.  ( 4 min )
    How a giant eagle came to dominate ancient New Zealand
    Evidence suggests eagle was part of a wave of feathered invaders.  ( 6 min )
    After careful consideration, NASA ready to launch SLS rocket as is
    "There’s no guarantee we’re going to get off on Saturday."  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Here's your chance to wear one of Randy Pitchford's shirts
    Gearbox CEO Randy Pitchford is auctioning off his selection of "loud shirts" to support "a developer scholarship". A tweet posted by the official Gearbox account links to a week-long auction which currently features 47 lots. At the time of writing, all have active bids on them, although it's impossible how much for, as every one is a "blind bid". "Gearbox fans may have noticed the loud shirts worn by our head honcho over the years," Gearbox tweeted. "Now these shirts can be yours! Read more  ( 15 min )
    Apex Legends averaged more players in August 2022 than ever before
    Apex Legends has set another record, setting a new minimum daily peak count of 329,041 players on Steam last month. As that only reflects the number of players on Steam and doesn't account for the thousands of players hot-dropping on console, too, it's a significant milestone for Respawn's fan-favourite battle royale, and is further bolstered by the shooter's recently revised concurrent player peak, which was also broken earlier this month. As evidenced on SteamDB and spotted by PCGN, in July, the minimum daily peak was 311,275, but in August jumped to 329,041 players. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Some Diablo Immortal players who used third-party Eternal Orbs resellers now can't play the game
    Diablo Immortal players who purchased Eternal Orbs via third-party sellers with real money have had their purchases revoked, leaving them with in-game debts. As one of the key currencies in the game, Eternal Orbs are crucial to progression, and are bought with real money. However, players who have forked out for Eternal Orbs via third-party sellers - no doubt in a bid to try and save a bit of money; in-game, they cost £0.89 GBP ($0.99 USD) for 60 all the way up to £89.99 GBP ($99.99 USD) for 7200 - have had their Orbs revoked. While there's little doubt that the Eternal Orbs were sold contrary to Blizzard's ToS and most players likely knew that going in, it's had a devastating impact on some players and led to significant deficits that will prevent them from fully participating in the game until the "debt" is cleared. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Striking Distance Studios' CEO posts, then deletes, a tweet thought by some to promote crunch culture
    Striking Distance Studios' founder Glen Schofield has deleted a tweet deemed by some to have promoted "crunch" culture in games development. In a tweet posted earlier today, Schofield - whose team is currently working on the upcoming sci-fi horror, The Callisto Protocol - talked about working 12-15 hours a day, six-seven days a week, and working over lunch and dinner, justifying it by saying "you do it because you love it". "I only talk about the game during an event," Schofield said in the since deleted tweet. "We [are] working six-seven days a week, nobody's forcing us. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Supermassive's next game will be another horror "equivalent in size" to The Quarry
    The Quarry developer Supermassive has confirmed it's already commenced work on its next game and yes, it's going to be the "same sort of horror" as its predecessors. In an interview with our friends at VGC, studio director Will Byles said that while he wasn't sure "how far [the team] could stretch the teen horror thing out further", another horror is on the way in either 2025 or 2026, and it will be the equivalent size of The Quarry rather than follow the episodic format of its anthology series, Dark Pictures. “We’ve started working on [the next game],” studio director Will Byles told VGC. "I can’t really tell you very much at all about it, but we have started. Again, it’s the same sort of horror genre, we’re sticking to that. It’s equivalent in size to The Quarry… and that’s about as much as I can say without giving too much away. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Two Point Campus is two weeks old and already has a million players
    University sim Two Point Campus has clocked up one million players in just a fortnight. Publisher Sega said its "bags of charm and tongue-in-cheek comedy" means the hit management sim has "surpassed the milestone even faster than its much-loved predecessor, Two Point Hospital". "Two Point Campus was such a thrill to create so we’re ecstatic to see so many people enjoying the game as much as they do!" said studio director, Mark Webley. "We had high hopes that we had created something that fans would love, but the response has exceeded all expectations! We’d like to send a massive thank you to all of the players out there who are showing support by building their wild and wonderful campuses – we can’t wait to see what more you’ll create." Read more  ( 16 min )
    The simmering wickedness of Pentiment's dialogue is a delight
    "Good writing" is a phrase that gets used quite often, and it can mean a lot of different things. Is good writing a good story? An unguessable twist? Fancy prose or deliberate themes? I'm sure I've used it at some point when what I meant to say is really: "lots of long words I don't completely understand." Still, Pentiment has good writing - wonderful writing, actually - and in this case I do know what it means. This game's writing is witty, it has tempo and timing, it is genuinely, wickedly funny. It is also, above all, natural - something that so often seems impossible in games, things where you're so often controlling a character impulsively, pulling their puppet strings on a whim. How do you write around that? Pentiment, Obsidian's surprise new thing that I am judging from an admittedly quite brief hands-on at Gamescom, seems to manage it remarkably well. Things begin in Pentiment with you choosing a background, in a fairly typical, tabletop RPG-inspired way but with a nicely in-theme twist, whereby you play as a semi-educated bloke with a choice of studies and interests. I chose to have studied Logic and dropped out halfway through Theology, with an interest in the Occult, a mediaeval gap year to Flanders and a bit of a taste for Hedonism (although I was tempted to be a Rapscallion who liked scampering about picking fights and generally being a peevish little imp, like a kind of Dark Age Bart Simpson. Hedonism ultimately just felt like it suited a dropout Theologian a little better.) Read more  ( 17 min )
    The unexpected dignity of morgues
    Content warning: this piece contains descriptions of the mortuary process. Morgues. All I have to do is write the word and it evokes a reaction. These places are steeped in our fundamental fears and preoccupations with death, and those fears and preoccupations are preyed upon by entertainment and amped up for horrors or police dramas. Chances are, you've never been in a morgue, but I bet you have an idea of what one looks like. I've been thinking about morgues this week because I've been in a couple and they made a strong impression on me. They're not real, they're in games, and the games are very much based around them. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Here's 18 minutes of New Tales from the Borderlands gameplay
    In the run up to New Tales from the Borderlands' release on 21st October, developer Gearbox has shared 18 minutes of new gameplay footage, offering the best look yet at this long-awaited follow-up to Telltale Games' acclaimed original. New Tales from the Borderlands follows the same choice-driven "interactive fiction" template as its predecessor - indeed, Gearbox has hired "key alumni" of the original Telltale Games narrative team for the project - but features three new protagonists in an all-new adventure. This time around, all eyes are on Fran Miscowicz - out for revenge after a Maliwan laser hits her frogurt shop - altruistic scientist Anuradha Dahr, and her ambitious "streetwise" brother Octavio Wallace-Dahr, who's looking to make his own mark on the metropolis of Promethea. Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    NASA scrubs Artemis mission yet again because SLS just can't handle the pressure
    SLS - Sitting, Leaking Slowly? It was second time unlucky for NASA as its Space Launch System rocket remained rooted to its Florida launch pad following a second scrub of its Moon mission.…  ( 5 min )
    Man wins competition with AI-generated artwork – and some people aren't happy
    Plus: Use machine learning to understand your cat ... possibly In brief  A man won an art competition with an AI-generated image crafted, and some people aren't best pleased about it.…  ( 6 min )
    Google, YouTube ban election trolls ahead of US midterms
    Plus: Truth Social barred from Play until it shows just one iota of decency Google and its YouTube subsidiary have joined other social media networks pledging to keep the 2022 US midterm elections safe and free from Russian trolls — and anyone else spewing democracy-damaging disinformation – by taking down such content.…  ( 6 min )
    DeFi venture OptiFi permanently locks up $661,000 of assets in code snafu
    Look who misunderstood the consequences a Solana close command OptiFi, a decentralized options exchange using the Solana blockchain, inadvertently disabled its mainnet service with a misunderstood command and locked up some $661,000 worth of USDC 'digital dollar' tokens.…  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Greg Coomer på Valve säger att de har flertalet spel under utveckling
    Half-Life 3 confirmed!!  ( 7 min )
    Aurora Punks släpper musikvideo i pixeltema tillsammans med Hooja
    Banan, Melon, Kiwi och Citron…*dunka, dunka*  ( 7 min )
    Homeworld 3
    20 år efter tvåan är det tid för nästa generations Homeworld. FZ spelar Homeworld 3.  ( 9 min )
    Naughty Dog hedrar en bortgången kollega i The Last of Us Part 1
    Daniel Kinnard görs odödlig av Naughty Dog.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Intel djupdyker i ray tracing-prestandan hos Arc A770
    Geforce RTX 3060 får konkurrens av Intel Arc även på ray tracing-fronten, åtminstone baserat på de siffror som grafikkortsdebutanten nu presenterar.  ( 6 min )
    DDR5 krymper prisskillnaden mot DDR4 fram till årsskiftet
    Med nya processorer på ingång är tillhörande DDR5-minne fortfarande dyrt. Detta ska successivt ändras, med en förbättrad prisnivå senast tidigt 2023.  ( 6 min )
    Helgsnack: Framtidssäkrar du ditt datorköp?
    Faktorer som prestanda och pris är ofta självklara när ny hårdvara ska införskaffas. Men hur viktigt är det för dig att hårdvaran är framtidssäker?  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Joachim Breitner: More recursive definitions
    Haskell is a pure and lazy programming language, and the laziness allows us to write some algorithms very elegantly, by recursively referring to already calculated values. A typical example is the following definition of the Fibonacci numbers, as an infinite stream: fibs = 0 : 1 : zipWith (+) fibs (tail fibs) Elegant graph traversals A maybe more practical example is the following calculation of the transitive closure of a graph: import qualified Data.Set as S import qualified Data.Map as M type Graph = M.Map Int (S.Set Int) transitive1 :: Graph -> Graph transitive1 g = sets where sets :: M.Map Int (S.Set Int) sets = M.mapWithKey (\v vs -> S.insert v (S.unions [ sets M.! v' | v' <- S.toList vs ])) g We represent graphs as maps from vertex to their successors vertex, and defin…  ( 3 min )
    Shirish Agarwal: Fantasy, J.R.R. Tolkein
    J.R.R. Tolkein Now unless you have been living under a rock cave, I am sure you know who Mr. Tolkein is. Apparently, the gentleman passed away on 2nd September 1973 at the sprightly age of 80. And this gives fans like me to talk about fantasy, fantasy authors, and the love-hate relationship we have with them. For a matter of record, I am currently reading Babylon Steel by Gaie Sebold. Now while I won’t go into many details (I never like to, if I enjoy a book, I would want the book to be mysterious rather than give praise, simply so that the next person enjoys it as much as I did without having any expectations.) Now this book has plenty of sex so wouldn’t recommend it for teenagers but more perhaps to mature audiences, although for the life of me couldn’t find any rating on the book. I did…  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    FWUPD Explores Improvement For Easier & More Robust Firmware Updating On Linux
    Currently when it comes to shipping new/updated device support for firmware updating under Linux with FWUPD/LVFS, it requires making/adjusting a Fwupd plug-in for carrying out the actual firmware copying/updating of the device and then adding in the device VID/PID to a quirks table so Fwupd knows about what to match a given device to for the firmware plug-in to use. Even in new devices where no plug-in changes are required, new device entries are still needed in the quirks table and it makes it challenging when Linux distributions don't quickly move to new FWUPD releases. Moving forward a better solution is being explored...  ( 6 min )
    KDE Plasma 5.26 Sees More Features & Fixes Ahead Of Beta
    There is a lot of last minute feature work and improvements heading into Plasma 5.26 ahead of its upcoming beta and feature freeze...  ( 5 min )
    Ubuntu Unity Becoming An Official Flavor With 22.10 Release
    While it's been years since Canonical dropped Unity as the official desktop environment of Ubuntu, some within the open-source community have still been maintaining it and running an unofficial Ubuntu Unity flavor of the distribution. Now with next month's Ubuntu 22.10 release, Ubuntu Unity will be an official flavor/spin...  ( 4 min )
    Chrome 106 Beta Adds Pop-Up API, SerialPort BYOB Reader Support
    Following this week's release of Chrome 105, Google has promoted Chrome 106 to their beta channel...  ( 5 min )
    PipeWire 0.3.57 Adds AAC Decoder, Opus For Bluetooth
    PipeWire 0.3.57 was released on Friday as the newest update to this Linux audio/video streams management solution that aims to fill the functionality currently provided by the likes of JACK and PulseAudio...  ( 4 min )
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    The £93 Lenovo Legion BoostStation GPU enclosure deal is back
    A few weeks ago we posted about a stellar deal on Lenovo's BoostStation, an external GPU enclosure that lets you turn almost any Thunderbolt 3 laptop into a gaming powerhouse with the simple addition of a graphics card. Rather than the £200 or £300 prices we normally see attached to these enclosures, this one was available at just £93. Now that deal is back, once again via the Laptop Outlet store on Ebay. This time though, you'll need to use code FANCY15 to knock 15% off the price of the BoostStation, bringing it down to that alluring £93 price point once again. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Store all the things with an 8TB Seagate IronWolf hard drive for £150
    Seagate's IronWolf and IronWolf Pro hard drives are amongst the best available, and now you can get an 8TB IronWolf model for £150 at Amazon, a historic low price. This is a huge amount of storage, ideal for archiving games and storing media like music and video, and well worth considering especially if your boot SSD is getting full. By comparison, the cheapest 8TB SSD is £669, making this more than four times cheaper. Read more  ( 16 min )
    What are we all playing this weekend?
    Oh September is it? Of the year 2022? Pull the other one. Go on, fine, tell me what you're playing this weekend, though I assume that's lies too. Here's what we're ostensibly clicking on! Read more  ( 16 min )
    RPS@PAX West 2022: Friday daily round-up
    The doors have been flung open for PAX West 2022 and we've been busy bouncing between booths, games, and panels all day. Liam and I have been busy making behind-the-scenes videos for our RPS supporters and the last one of today is our daily round-up! We'll be recording and uploading one at the end of each day as a handy summary of what we got up to. Watch below and enjoy! Read more  ( 15 min )
    RPS@PAX West 2022: Gearbox tells us what's new in New Tales From the Borderlands
    It's been a busy day at PAX West, but nothing has been as wild as the Gearbox Software panel. Randy Pitchford made a return to the Seattle stage to let us know what's coming up for Gearbox, but not without some shenanigans first. After a classic Randy magic trick, a proud display of lock-down Lego builds, and a chaotic bidding war where he auctioned off the literal shirt off his back (which an audience member bought for an eye-watering $1200) we finally got to see some fresh New Tales From The Borderlands gameplay and had a lovely chat with director of production, James Lopez. Watch the video below for the interview in its entirety - it's a good'un! Read more  ( 16 min )
    RPS@PAX West 2022: Tour of the show floor
    Join us for our mega tour of the PAX West show floor where we go behind the scenes of the show's hustle and bustle to bring you a little slice of PAX gaming heaven. We've been stomping around the show floor looking at all of West's greatest sights, including bonkers booths, game demos, cool cosplays, and all the different gaming areas to give you a full picture of everything there is to see at PAX. Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    A genre is born: Horde games
    Vampire Survivors-like? Top-down Action-roguelike? Reverse bullet hell? One-stick shooter? Let's take a look.  ( 6 min )
    This great bundle of Native Linux games will tease your brain
    Want some games that will test your brain and perhaps help you learn a little in the process? The Level Up and Learn: Programming Games bundle from Humble Bundle will do just that.  ( 3 min )
  • Open

    Comic for 2022.09.03 - Temple
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )

  • Open

    "Telltale will remember that": Why New Tales from the Borderlands dropped the infamous conversation prompt
    The Walking Dead, Game of Thrones, Batman, The Wolf Among Us, Minecraft, Borderlands, Guardians of the Galaxy… the reign of Telltale Games, at its peak, was truly something to behold. Between 2010 and 2016, the studio churned out a number of games that defined the conversation in gaming. You couldn’t open a gaming mag (or navigate the homepage of a gaming site) without something from Telltale making itself known. Its games were everywhere, all of the time. Until they weren’t. The studio hit critical mass, and the quality of its games suffered: from 2017 onwards, after a restructuring of the studio that affected the cadence of its releases, the studio fell from grace. In trying to recreate the magic of The Walking Dead, Telltale creatively suffocated its staff and homogenised its output. A series of gaffes soiled the company’s reputation. As quickly as the world fell in love with the studio, it forgot about it. The second season of the Wolf Among Us, as well as a planned Stranger Things game, were cancelled. But that’s not to say there’s anything wrong with the formula: in fact, quite the opposite is true. During its height, people loved Telltale because it harkened back to an era of classic, narrative-focused adventure games. You don’t sell 28 million-plus episodes if there’s something fundamentally wrong with the way your games work, do you? To that end, you can see why Gearbox Software partnered with “key alumni” of the original Telltale Games narrative team revisit one of the most cult titles in the studio’s back catalogue: Tales From the Borderlands. Read more  ( 18 min )
    What are you playing this weekend?
    It's a three-day weekend in the US, which means those of you in the region will hopefully be enjoying the time off. The Labor Day weekend is usually like any other long weekend in the US. Full of barbeques, relaxing, having a few drinks, and enjoying what's left of the summer. As you see, this is the last summer holiday weekend for us, and it also signals the end of the swimming season at public pools. This is fine for some of us who have a phobia of community swimming pools (pools are NOT a unrinal people!) For the rest of the folks not in the US, it's probably just an ordinary weekend, but time off nonetheless, so why not enjoy it by playing some games? That's what the folks at VG247 plan to do. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Crusader Kings 3's Friends and Foes pack adds over 100 events related to your characters’ relationships
    Crusader Kings 3 is getting a new event pack next week called Friends and Foes, and it will add all sorts of potential drama to your relationships. As if relationships in the game aren't full of enough drama as it stands now, things could become worse - or better. It depends on how things play out. In the pack, your relationships will matter more than ever as those closest to you come alive in "the most intimate detail." This is thanks to over 100 new experiences included in the new event pack. Read more  ( 15 min )
    CD Projekt will discuss what's next for Cyberpunk 2077 on September 6 in a Night City Wire stream
    CD Projekt Red will talk about all things Cyberpunk next week on September 6, and specifically about what's next for Cyberpunk 2077. The studio will also discuss its anime series Cyberpunk: Edgerunners which is scheduled to debut on Netflix September 13. The show is a joint project between CD Projekt, Studio Trigger, and Netflix and is set in Cyberpunk 2077’s universe, but features a different story and takes place in a separate period. Read more  ( 15 min )
    UK still probing Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard, concerned it will "lessen competition”
    The UK government’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is concerned that Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard could “substantially lessen competition” in consoles, multi-game subscription services, and cloud gaming services. According to a public notice from the CMA, it is concerned that should Microsoft purchase Activision Blizzard, it would harm rivals by refusing access to the company’s games, such as Overwatch or Call of Duty, or providing access on bad terms. The CMA said it received evidence about the “potential impact” of combining Activision Blizzard with Microsoft’s broader ecosystem. It feels the latter could “leverage Activision Blizzard’s games” with its strength across console, cloud, and PC operating systems to “damage competition in the nascent market” for cloud gaming services. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Immortality review – A haunting love-letter to the silver screen that will keep you awake at night
    I find that there’s quite the divide between video games and cinema, and that isn’t necessarily a problem for either industry, but Sam Barlow’s latest game – Immortality – shows just how powerful intertwining the two can be, when done effectively. Jean-Luc Godard, a renowned French-Swiss film director and critic, once said “a story should have a beginning, middle, and an end… but not necessarily in that order.” Immortality is perhaps one of the most ideal examples of Godard’s words in practice. As you try to unravel the mystery of Marissa Marcel (Manon Gage), you find yourself using a Moviola, threading together random clips from the three movies that she starred in. Marcel’s first film, Ambrosio, borrows its plot from the Gothic novel, The Monk. It’s equal parts sexy and unnerving, and the temptress character that Marcel plays seems to flow into her next film, too. Minsky followed a year later with a new director, John Durick, and saw Marcel play an artist’s muse in a murder-mystery. Finally, 20 years later, Marcel worked on Two of Everything – once again with John Durick, and after a period of inactivity from the actress. In this one, the tone is even darker than before; Marcel plays a successful pop-star with a body double, but everything goes awry. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Microsoft provides details for Xbox Game Pass Friends and Family Plan including price
    Microsoft has provided details for its Xbox Game Pass Friends & Family plan which is currently in testing in Columbia and Ireland. The company started testing the expanded Xbox Game Pass subscription service in early August with Xbox Insiders in both countries. With Xbox Game Pass Friends & Family, five accounts share the benefits of Game Pass Ultimate, allowing you, your family, and friends to play the Game Pass library of games on console, PC, and cloud together. Read more  ( 16 min )
    MultiVersus will add adorable mogwai Gizmo as a playable character next week
    MultiVersus has announced that Gizmo, the adorable mogwai from the iconic 80s horror-comedy Gremlins, will be joining the roster of playable characters. While not the biggest fan of fighting games, but this little dude will almost certainly have me diving into MultiVersus again when he’s released on Tuesday, 6 September. Whenever September rolls around, I immediately begin to feel autumnal, even if the sun is still shining. You know that it’s a matter of time before Halloween rolls around, then Christmas, and then the New Year. It all goes far too fast, but there is one thing that I love about this type of year; watching all the seasonal films that feel wrong to watch at any other time. I think the team at Player First Games must share similar sentiments, because one of these films is Gremlins. So, introducing Gizmo as we approach autumn feels like perfect timing; especially when we know Stripe is also right around the corner. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Yu-Gi-Oh! Cross Duel — the 4 player card game — launches September 6
    YuGiOh Cross Duel, the four-player digital card game announced a while back by Konami, is launching on mobile platforms September 6. In this version of YuGiOh, four players take up a slot in a four-way free for all, sending monsters towards other players via lanes. In addition, there are cooperative modes present that have each of the four players face off against one giant, hugely powerful monster in the centre of the board. If you’re not a fan of all this shiny multiplayer content, then single player modes will also be available on launch. As with prior YuGiOh games, fans of the old TV shows can expect to see a variety of characters they recognise pop up in-game, so you can represent your favourite version of the YuGiOh cartoon. Plus, this game has some pretty neat 3D models of some of the more iconic monsters, which is sure to mean a lot to those of you out there with a love for the series’ greatest hits. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Islets review – If the wait for Hollow Knight: Silksong is getting you down, you need to try this
    There’s a supermarket chain here in Europe called Lidl, and if you don’t know what to expect when you enter, it’s baffling. One of the strangest places on earth for the unprepared. The shelves are lined with goods that are almost what you get in other supermarkets – almost. The branding is slightly askew, the brand-famous colours slightly off; the cola is a bit more burgundy, the chocolate a more muted shade of purple. The Oreos are called Neos, for some reason. It’s like wandering into a peculiar – significantly cheaper – otherworld. That’s what Islets is to Hollow Knight. It’s the off-brand, cheaply-made budget version of everyone’s favourite premium Metroidvania. You can tell exactly what it’s going for – the combat, the aesthetic, the level design, the enemies, and even the graves of the humongous creatures that came before… they’re all there, and intact. But instead of that painterly style Team Cherry has injected into the doomed undergrowth of Hollow knight, you’ve got this Flash game aesthetic. Instead of a rich, sweeping soundscape, you’ve got a hodgepodge collection of sound effects and some much more simplistic music. But none of that is bad. In fact, the simplicity of it all – this decidedly off-brand feel – works in the game’s favour. It means you don’t get too distracted from the cool mechanics, from the simple-but-effective combat, from the tight platforming. Everything on-screen is readable, simple to parse: the cracks at the end of this map? That’s a secret, for sure. The big pink glowing skeleton circling this block? That’ll hurt you if you touch it. This rotating red circle in the middle of your airship? Well, that’ll be your hitbox. Read more  ( 18 min )
    VG247's The Best Games Ever Podcast – Ep.15: Best game with a wedding in it
    I’ll come clean. I’m writing this well in advance of publication as I’m going on holiday. I usually spend literal minutes coming up with a brilliant way to segue into the topic of the week’s podcast. It is often very brilliant and hilarious. The relationship between me and the podcast article is complicated. It’s not easy. It requires work for it to be the best it can be. You can’t just turn up and hope to have a great podcast article without trying your hardest. Sometimes I even hold a little ceremony before I write the article, just to show how serious I am about writing it. It’s a big deal, so I have to make sure I’ve thought it through properly. But I’m not doing that today, because of the holiday reason I mentioned above – a holiday I’m taking after writing the article, which is in no way related to the topic of the podcast. Read more  ( 17 min )
    With the big boys out to lunch, Focus Home Interactive stole the show at Gamescom
    It was a weird year for Gamescom in 2022; with the absence of two of the big three (and Microsoft only making a showing of a few Game Pass hits), the schedule was cleared for smaller publishers to put their best foot forward and show off the goods. The result? A pretty interesting and esoteric show, with a massive focus on horror, and with the spotlight shining bright on studios that may otherwise have been overshadowed by their first-party peers. Smaller publishers, then, had a killer show. Whether that was Koch with System Shock, Dead Island 2, and Goat Simulator 3, or Krafton with Moonbreaker and The Callisto Protocol, the not-Ubisofts and not-Microsofts of Gamescom made a lasting impact. But amongst them all, there was one publisher that really stood out to me, and you’ll probably be able to guess who that was based on the coverage myself and Alex Donaldson have put out from the show to date. It was Focus Home Interactive. First up, there’s Evil West: a game which sells you as a Wild West Superhero, armed to the teeth and pissed off about the vampire threat that threatens to shake the frontier lands of a fledgling USA. Part-Bulletstorm, part-Devil May Cry, and part-Clint Eastwood via Tarantino Western B-movie, Evil West has everything I want from my action games in 2022. Explosions, foul mouths, tight and responsive gameplay, and the most ludicrous, over-the-top nonsense you could ask for. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn's gameplay is a mix of God of War and Souls
    We finally have a proper, long look at Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn's gameplay. At gamescom, developer A44 brought a new build of the game to show off to the press, and subsequently released a new trailer with a deeper look at gameplay. As a follow-up to Ashen, Flintlock was always assumed to be a Souls-like in some ways. While this remains true, the game is leaning harder into God of War and even spectacle fighters than it initially appeared. At five minutes-long, the video starts off simple; showing off the meaty hatchet combat and how the flintlock pistol fits into the flow. But it quickly skips to the more involved parts of the action. When near death, enemies appear to glow like in the modern Doom games, and catching them in that window delivers a God of War-like finisher. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Sons of the Forest delayed again to February 2023 — misses Halloween
    Sons of the Forest, the survival horror title initially planned for a close-to-Halloween release, has been delayed one last time to February 2023. According to a tweet from the official Twitter account for the game, this delay is so the team can “complete the polish we feel is needed”. Bittersweet news for those who have been crossing their fingers for this title as a late-in-the-year treat. However, as Sons of the Forest is the sequel to the hugely popular PC horror title The Forest, the importance of nailing a first impression makes sense. The prior game quickly became one of the most popular spooky experiences on the platform, meaning there’s a lot of hype out there for what Endnight Games has in store. Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    Chances good for NASA Artemis SLS Moon launch on Saturday
    Fingers crossed this prodigious test will have a good weather experience NASA will try to launch its Space Launch System (SLS) rocket to the Moon on Saturday after its first attempt on August 29 was scrubbed due to what turned out to be a faulty sensor on one of its core engines.…  ( 5 min )
    Convicted felon busted for 3D printing gun parts
    Just days after US rules tackling homemade firearms take effect A US man has admitted he broke the law when he used 3D printers to make components converting semi-automatic guns to full auto.…  ( 5 min )
    Meta hedges bets on metaverse silicon with Qualcomm VR deal
    More silicon sales for us says Qualcomm Meta’s latest move in the effort to reinvent Second Life, or roll out the metaverse, involves building better VR chips and it's trusting Qualcomm with the job.…  ( 5 min )
    Microsoft extends Teams into VMware and Citrix VDI
    Users will now be able to blur or replace their backgrounds during video meetings or calls Microsoft is making it easier for Teams to work with virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) in a bid to grow the number of monthly active users on the collaboration platform.…  ( 5 min )
    Revealed: US telcos admit to storing, handing over location data
    Letters to FCC prove what many believed, but don't address a bigger problem US mobile carriers know a lot about where their customers are located, and according to letters sent to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), they routinely store such data for years, willingly hand it over to law enforcement if served a proper subpoena, and say users can't opt out.…  ( 7 min )
    US semiconductor industry has a lot of ideas about where CHIPS Act money should go
    Outsourced assembly and test a key missing part of supply chain, and foreign entities aren't beyond the pale Stakeholders in the semiconductor industry have a clear-eyed view of the changes that should happen in order for the US to rebuild a leading position in chip manufacturing, and a wide-ranging approach addressing the entire supply chain is needed.…  ( 6 min )
    Internet pranksters send hundreds of cabs to Moscow street, cause gridlock
    'Improved algorithm' set to keep miscreants at bay, web-based taxi service promises The taxi offshoot of troubled Russian tech giant Yandex has been hit by online pranksters, who yesterday ordered dozens of cabs to a single address in central Moscow, resulting in a major traffic jam.…  ( 5 min )
    Online intruders send hundreds of cabs to Moscow street, cause gridlock
    'Improved algorithm' set to keep miscreants at bay, web-based taxi service promises The taxi offshoot of troubled Russian tech giant Yandex has been hit by online pranksters, who yesterday ordered dozens of cabs to a single address in central Moscow, resulting in a major traffic jam.…  ( 5 min )
    Taiwan chip magnate pledges cash for defense against China: 'I'm telling everyone to oppose the CCP'
    UMC founder Robert Tsao wants to train more than 3m 'civilian warriors' and sharpshooters A Taiwanese semiconductor magnate is to provide the money to prime several million "civilian warriors" and marksmen to help defend the island nation in the event of an invasion by China.…  ( 4 min )
    Indian court directs chat app Telegram to disclose details of copyright infringers
    Judge says that servers being located in Singapore is not a get-out clause A ruling handed down from the Delhi High Court this week declared that Telegram must hand over information such as IP addresses, mobile numbers, and devices used by channels on the platform involved in copyright infringement.…  ( 5 min )
    Amazon fails to overturn New York City union election
    National Labor Relations Board says company had not met the burden of proof for its objections Amazon's attempt to rerun the election that resulted in workers unionizing at a warehouse in New York City have been shut down by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).…  ( 5 min )
    Windows 10 business refresh will revive PC shipments
    Or so says a hopeful IDC after releasing latest forecast of doom The pandemic fueled buying frenzy in the PC industry looks to be well and truly over with analysts at IDC forecasting a double digit decline in shipments this year, and growth hopes for next pinned on a Windows 10 enterprise refresh.…  ( 4 min )
    Intel details 12th Gen Core SoCs optimized for edge applications
    OS support includes Windows 10 IoT Enterprise 2021 LTSC and Linux options Intel has made available versions of its 12th-generation Core processors optimized for edge and IoT applications, claiming the purpose-built chips enable smaller form factor designs, but with the AI inferencing performance to analyze data right at the edge.…  ( 4 min )
    UK government says contractors should challenge IR35 status via self-assesment
    What could possibly go wrong? The UK government has suggested IT contractors should challenge errors in their tax status and reclaim overpaid tax through self-assessment.…  ( 7 min )
    EU proposes regulations for tablet battery life, spare parts
    Rules for devices including phones aimed at reducing environmental impact of scroll addiction The European Union is proposing legislation which will make manufacturers of tablets and smartphones offer longer-life batteries and spare parts for at least five years.…  ( 4 min )
    Microsoft, Activision Blizzard have days to show merger won't harm competition
    Brit watchdog says what we're all thinking, motions for deeper investigation Following the launch of a merger inquiry into Microsoft's acquisition of video game developer and publisher Activision Blizzard in July, the UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said yesterday it had identified potential concerns about the tie-up.…  ( 6 min )
    Terminal downgrade saves the day after a client/server heist
    When the PCs were pilfered by ram raiding rotters, green screens proved their worth On Call  Welcome again to On-Call, The Register’s trawl through readers’ reminiscences of tech trials and tribulations.…  ( 4 min )
    VMware’s Amazonian incarnation drops requirement to run on dedicated hosts
    vSphere users can start smaller without paying cluster-bucks VMware Explore  VMware has made a profound change to its partnership with AWS by removing the need to run its wares on dedicated clusters.…  ( 5 min )
    Lenovo launches face-mounted monitor
    Not worthy of the name 'smart glasses' and not sold outside China until 2023 Lenovo has launched a face-mounted wearable monitor.…  ( 4 min )
    Microsoft changes the way it certifies network cards for Windows Server
    Increased ‘configuration not supported’ heartbreak sparks move Microsoft’s networking team has made a change to the way certifies network interface cards (NICs) for use in Windows Server.…  ( 4 min )
    USB-C to hit 80Gbps under updated USB4 v. 2.0 spec
    You’re going to need new cables and learn to recognize revised logos The USB Promoter Group has announced version 2.0 of the USB4 spec and promises it can carry data at 80Gbps.…  ( 4 min )
    Ex-NSA trio who spied on Americans for UAE now banned from arms exports
    From hero to zero-day ... to plain zero Three former US government cyber-spies who, among other things, illicitly compromised and snooped on Americans' devices for the United Arab Emirates government have been banned from participating in international arms exports under a deal reached with Uncle Sam.…  ( 5 min )
    How this Mars rover used its MOXIE to convert CO2 into precious oxygen
    Producing vital gas out of Red Planet's hostile atmosphere? Truly a test of Perseverance The oxygen-generator onboard NASA's Perseverance rover, which has repeatedly extracted the vital gas from the Martian atmosphere in tests, has been detailed in a scientific paper published this week.…  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Best Raspberry Pi Projects: September 2022
    The Raspberry Pi projects are plentiful as we roll into September—this list has 10 of the best ones we’ve had the honor of featuring over the past month.  ( 64 min )
    Best Graphics Cards for Gaming in 2022
    We've benchmarked all the latest GPUs to select the best graphics cards for gaming. These graphics cards offer the best performance at their price and resolution, from 1080p to 4K.  ( 93 min )
    Xbox Partners With IHOP for Gaming Rewards and Xbox Menu Items
    The best gaming rewards are the 1-month Xbox Game Pass Ultimate trial, the Forza Horizon 5 Premium Add-Ons Bundle, and full game download codes for Grounded.  ( 63 min )
    GPU Benchmarks and Hierarchy 2022: Graphics Cards Ranked
    Our GPU benchmarks hierarchy ranks all the current and previous generation graphics cards based on real-world gaming tests. Find out how the latest GPUs stack up.  ( 95 min )
    Lenovo ThinkPad Z13 Review: Faux Leather Freshness
    The Lenovo ThinkPad Z13 has an attractive and fresh design, but its AMD components aren't always the fastest at office tasks.  ( 71 min )
    Seasonic's PSUs with Next-Gen 12VHPWR Connector to Start at $230
    Entry-level Seasonic's ATX 3.0 PSUs with 12VHPWR connector for next-generation graphics cards not going to be too expensive.  ( 63 min )
    Labor Day Discount Brings AMD’s Ryzen 7 5800X3D Down to its Lowest Price Ever, $365: Real Deals
    Having already covered a price drop on the 5800X3D this week, it's a surprise to see its price fall even further. But, thanks to a Labor Day sale, you can now pick up AMD's Ryzen 7 5800X3D on eBay (via seller Antonline) for just $365.  ( 67 min )
    Sausage-Style GPU Thermal Paste Application Results in Lowest Temps
    Igor's Lab ran tests on a GeForce RTX 3080 with a liquid cooler to test various thermal paste application techniques.  ( 60 min )
    PC Market to Decline Steeply in 2022, Will Rebound in 2024: IDC
    PC unit shipments heading south and will not rebound to pandemic levels any time soon.  ( 60 min )
    Entry-Level DDR5 Prices Expected To Drop Rapidly This Year
    DDR5 prices are expected to duplicate what happened in 2021, and rapidly decline by 2023.  ( 59 min )
    Best Gaming PCs of 2022
    We test prebuilt gaming PCs with our typical gauntlet of real-world and synthetic benchmarks to measure overall system performance.  ( 76 min )
    HP Elite Dragonfly G3 Review: Expensive, but Excellent
    With great battery life, a pleasing 3:2 display and excellent port selection, HP's Elite Dragonfly G3 is a superb high-end business portable. But it's expensive, and there are very good alternatives that cost less.  ( 74 min )
    Snapmaker 2.0 Modular 3-in-1 Review: 3D printer, Laser Cutter and CNC
    A deluxe three-in-one machine for makers short on space.  ( 68 min )
    Arc A770 Beats RTX 3060 in Ray Tracing Performance, According to Intel Benchmarks
    Intel has shared lower level details along with multiple ray tracing benchmarks for the upcoming Arc A770 graphics card, pitching it against the GeForce RTX 3060.  ( 64 min )
  • Open

    Microsoft says Call of Duty will be on PlayStation for "at least several more years" beyond existing deal
    As governmental scrutiny of Microsoft's proposed $69bn USD acquisition of publisher Activision Blizzard grows - particularly in relation to its impact on PlayStation - Microsoft has revealed a commitment to keeping Call of Duty on PlayStation platforms for "at least several more years" beyond Sony's existing marketing deal. That's according to a statement given to The Verge in which Microsoft said the commitment was made by Xbox boss Phil Spencer to PlayStation head Jim Ryan earlier this year and formalised in a signed agreement. "In January," Spencer told The Verge in part of a statement shared by the publication, "we provided a signed agreement to Sony to guarantee Call of Duty on PlayStation, with feature and content parity, for at least several more years beyond the current Sony contract, an offer that goes well beyond typical gaming industry agreements". Read more  ( 16 min )
    Splitgate "ending feature development" so dev can focus on new game in same universe
    Developer 1047 Games has announced it will be "ending feature development" on its acclaimed free-to-play sci-fi shooter Splitgate in order to shift its focus to creating a new game in the same universe. Splitgate - which has been described as "Halo meets Portal" in some quarters - made quite the splash last year. Despite having been around on PC since May 2019, an open crossplay beta for Xbox, PlayStation, and PC proved so popular that 1047 Games elected to delay the game's multi-platform early access launch in order to better accommodate its unexpected surge in popularity. 1047 Games has continued to build on that success in the months since, most recently launching Splitgate's beta season two in July. However, the developer has now said it will be "ending feature development" on the game as a result of what it seemingly considers to be insurmountable legacy issues. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Here's a little look at God of War Ragnarök's new combat additions
    If your thirst for God of War Ragnarök news remains unsated, you might be interested in a brief new look at the game's combat, which has been shared - bows a-twanging and axes a-bonking - in the run up to release on 9th November. The 100-second clip comes courtesy of GameInformer, and features a bit of ultraviolence against new bipedal lizard foes known as Grims. While a lot of it appears to be business as usual for God of War (Kratos still has his Leviathan Axe and Blades of Chaos, and Atreus retains his beloved bow and arrow), an accompanying write-up details some new combat additions, including Weapon Signature Moves. Read more  ( 16 min )
    11 bit studios will no longer give keys to Steam curators
    11 bit studios has released a statement saying it will no longer issue Steam keys to curators. The developer, known for This War of Mine and Frostpunk, will follow this rule starting from today, following on from the recent awareness of key scammers posing as curators. In its statement, the studio said that the decision was made based on its own experiences and those of other developers. Read more  ( 16 min )
    CD Projekt to reveal "what's next" for Cyberpunk 2077 next week
    Cyberpunk 2077 developer CD Projekt Red will reveal its plans for the future of the game next week, via a fresh livestream. A "special episode" of the developer's Night City Wire video series will broadcast next Tuesday, 6th September at 4pm UK time. Will this be when we finally get a glimpse of Cyberpunk 2077's long-awaited multiplayer component? Will we see a single-player expansion? Or is this just more hairstyles for V? Read more  ( 15 min )
    Evercade's new EXP handheld includes 18 Capcom games built-in
    18 Capcom classics will come pre-loaded on the Evercade EXP. Evercade's new retro game handheld was announced earlier this year by Blaze Entertainment, and builds on past hardware by adding a better screen, built-in Wi-Fi, and a new pair of triggers. Today, we learned that it would also come with 14 Capcom arcade games and four more home console titles packed in, including Street Fighter 2: Hyper Fighting, Mega Man and Breath of Fire. Read more  ( 15 min )
    All the goss from Gamescom, and why Immortality dazzles
    Our Chris is back from Gamescom and he's pooped, yet despite that, it sounds as though he had a nice time. Who needs all the hullabaloo when a quieter event allows smaller games some air? In today's episode of Weekly, Chris takes us back there, to Gamescom, sharing what it was like on the show floor, as well as the games that caught his eye and the gossip he heard. It's particularly entertaining to hear about his meeting with Callisto Protocol boss Glen Schofield, who seems to have left quite an impression - an impression Chris delightfully re-enacts. We also dive into the big review of the week, Immortality, which Chris wrote. This is the new game from Her Story and Telling Lies developer Sam Barlow, so it arrives with anticipation. And it seems it dazzlingly lives up to it. And here we hear why. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Naughty Dog pays tribute to developer who passed away during The Last of Us Part 1 production
    A touching tribute from Naughty Dog can be found in the newly-released Last of Us Part 1 for the PlayStation 5. This tribute recognises the work of Visual Arts producer Daniel Kinnard, who passed away during the game's production. His image can be seen immortalised within the game, where the developer has been reimagined as a pro baseball player for the Denver Skulls on a poster adorning the walls of the farmhouse players search when looking for Ellie. Read more  ( 15 min )
    GoldenEye 007 mod gives Super Mario's Koopa Troopas KF7 rifles
    Two classic games from the Nintendo 64 era have met in a rather unusual crossover thanks to modders. GoldenEye 007 has been given a Mario-inspired makeover, which sees a multitude of Koopas patrolling through a custom-made version of Nintendo 64's Bomb-omb Battlefield with KF7 Soviet rifles and hand grenades. Of course, the turtle-like foot soldiers and their Bob-omb comrades do not stand a chance against this Bond-like Mario protagonist and his own weaponary. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Xbox Game Pass Friends and Family launches in Ireland and Columbia
    Xbox has officially announced its Game Pass Friends and Family plan, which is already available in Columbia and the Republic of Ireland. A few days ago, a logo for the plan, which was reportedly scraped from Xbox's backend system, surfaced online. Xbox has now made an official announcement unveiling the new plan, including details on what exactly it includes and pricing. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The eye-catching Riley and Rochelle is a tale about "love, pop and the 90s"
    A new game that centres on "love, pop and the '90s" is set to release this autumn. Riley and Rochelle from Sheinman Games will take players on a deductive journey, following the lives of two singers from two different backgrounds who fall in love... and also fall apart. Players will create their own documentary about the two stars as they "take a nuanced yet insider look at the pop culture world" of the '90s. Diary entries, along with a catalogue of Riley and Rochelle's older records, will work as a framework for the narrative, with the developer stating "the player will choose how they want the film to end, and who gets to come out on top." Here's a trailer: Read more  ( 15 min )
    The Pokémon Company sues Chinese clone, seeks £62m and public apology
    The Pokémon Company is taking legal action against a popular Chinese mobile game, Pocket Monster Issue, which it claims is a Pokémon clone. (No, not like Ditto. Or those Pokémon that Mewtwo made in the movie.) Pocket Monster Issue is a popular smartphone game in the country, and has been running for more than five years. According to the South China Morning Post (thanks, GamesIndustry.biz), The Pokémon Company is seeking damages worth 500 million yuan (around £62m), and a series of public apologies posted on major gaming websites. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Ninja says he needs a break
    Twitch streamer Tyler "Ninja" Blevins has seemingly decided to take a break from streaming. Ninja is known for streaming Fortnite and is currently the most followed channel on Twitch with over 18 million followers. After some unusual behaviour on his social media accounts, it's left some people confused as to what exactly has happened. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Domina delisted by Steam after developer's transphobic rant
    Indie Gladiator game Domina has been delisted from Steam, after its developer went off on a transphobic rant. Developer Nicholas John Leonhard Groissen took it upon himself to use his game as a platform to spout these comments in a recent 'update' announcing Domina's new name - Dominus. "We're Out of Ideas, Mentally Unstable, Totally Degenerate, & Desperate for Clout - Let's Pretend We're A Completely Different Game to Regain Relevance!" the post began. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Nintendo to gut Mario Kart Tour of grubby gacha elements
    After two years of operation, Nintendo has decided to scrub Mario Kart Tour of its gacha-like elements. Nintendo's smartphone version of Mario Kart currently allows you to dump currency into an in-game warp pipe in exchange for randomised rewards, such as characters and karts. This will soon be replaced by a Fortnite-style rotating item shop, where you can exchange currency for items directly. Read more  ( 15 min )
    What we've been playing
    Hello! Welcome back to our regular feature where we write a little bit about some of the games we've found ourselves playing over the last few days. This time: juice, B-Type, and a bit of spelunking. If you fancy catching up on some of the older editions of What We've Been Playing, here's our archive. Poinpy is one of the first Netflix games, a surprisingly great selection of smartphone treats that are worryingly easy to miss or forget about, given the streaming giant's slightly odd rollout. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Creative Assembly's Hyenas makes more sense now we've seen it in action
    We'd been waiting a little while to learn something concrete about Creative Assembly's long-rumoured first-person shooter, but when Hyenas was finally revealed, the response was maybe a little muted. Hyenas was a surprise: Creative Assembly had been an entirely strategy-based studio for decades until it released Alien Isolation, a small, considered first-person game. A multiplayer, co-op, character-based shooter with a loud and brash tone doesn't seem like the most natural follow-up. But then, Alien Isolation wasn't exactly a natural follow-up to Total War, and speaking to Eurogamer at Gamescom, product director Alex Hunnisett explained that, actually, these games are rarely interlinked - despite some staff from within the studio moving across to work on it. "Really, when we were looking at Hyenas, it was a case of going, well, what are folks enjoying playing at the moment, for starters, and the great thing about working in a studio is often you're enjoying doing something, you've got enough capable people around you just go, 'let's just do that then.'" Aside from the fact that both games are set in space, he said, that's really where the similarities or shared inspirations end. Hyenas, like Alien Isolation before it, is very much its own thing. Read more  ( 19 min )
    G2 Esports announces new all-female League of Legends team
    G2 Esports has announced a brand new all-female League of Legends team, one of the first of its kind. The team, called Hel, is named after Norse mythology's goddess of death and includes the elite players Olivia "Olizia" Nnenna Calistus, Agnė "Karina" Ivaškevičiūtė, Alena "TIFA" Maurer, Maya "Caltys" Henckel and Ève "Colomblbl" Monvoisin. It follows the similarly all-female Valorant team G2 Gozen formed last year and proves G2's commitment to boosting the visibility of women in esports and to eventually empower men and women to compete together in future. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Crusader Kings 3's Friends & Foes DLC adding over 100 new relationship-themed events next week
    Paradox Interactive's acclaimed Medieval grand strategy game Crusader Kings 3 is set to make its historical tapestry a little richer next Thursday, 8th September, with the arrival of the Friends and Foes Event Pack DLC, promising over a hundred new events. These new player-driven stories, which can be encountered throughout ordinary play, all have relationships at their heart, but not necessarily the positive kind. One the one hand, players can "uncover novel ways to become pals with those [they] hold dear or even achieve the coveted best friend status", but on the other, Paradox says players should "be prepared for ever more dangerous rivals, sharpening their vengeful knives to get back at you." Stories are at the heart of Crusader Kings 3, so more narrative options are always welcome, but those uninterested in laying down cash for the Friends & Foes Event Pack will also have something to look forward to - a number of additional free features and changes will be arriving simultaneously as part of the new 1.7 Bastion Update. Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    sdl12-compat 1.2.54 Pre-Release Gets More Games Running On This SDL2 Compatibility Layer
    The sdl12-compat is a SDL 1.2 compatibility layer implementation atop SDL 2.0. This sdl12-compat project allows for old, out-of-date games and other applications relying on the old SDL 1.2 interface to in turn run via the modern SDL2 library for better compatibility with input devices, Wayland support (assuming no direct X11 hard dependencies), support for PipeWire audio, improved input controls, and various other enhancements only found in SDL 2.0 and not the unmaintained SDL 1.2...  ( 5 min )
    Intel's Open-Source Driver Lands Vulkan Mesh Shader Support
    Intel's open-source "ANV" Vulkan driver for Linux systems has added support for the newly-ratified Vulkan mesh shader extension...  ( 5 min )
    Call Depth Tracking Mitigation Updated For Linux In Better Mitigating Retbleed
    Back in July Intel's Peter Zijlstra proposed "Call Depth Tracking" as a mitigation approach for handling Retbleed and avoiding the "performance horror show" of Indirect Branch Restricted Speculation (IBRS) usage. Out today is the newest version of the Call Depth Tracking code and the performance benchmark results are looking very promising for lessening the pain of the Retbleed CPU mitigation performance impact...  ( 6 min )
    Intel Vulkan Driver Split Happens - "HASVK" Introduced For Older Gen7/Gen8 Graphics
    The recently proposed Intel open-source Vulkan driver split where the Gen7/Gen8 graphics support would be shifted off to a separate "new" legacy driver has happened to allow the Intel ANV Vulkan driver to move forward with its Skylake "Gen9" graphics and later focus...  ( 5 min )
    Ubuntu 22.10 Readied With The Linux 5.19 Kernel
    As expected, Ubuntu 22.10 will be powered by the Linux 5.19 kernel...  ( 5 min )
    Mesa's Rust OpenCL Implementation Expected To Be Merged In Coming Days
    As part of experimenting with using Rust code inside Mesa, longtime Mesa developer Karol Herbst of Red Hat has been developing Rusticl as a new Rust-based OpenCL implementation for Gallium3D and an alternative to the long-standing "Clover" OpenCL state tracker. That Rusticl code with the initial Rust infrastructure for Mesa is expected to be merged in the coming days...  ( 4 min )
    Systemd OOMD Will Now Honor "ManagedOOMPreference" For All cgroups
    Stemming from Ubuntu 22.04 LTS activating systemd's out-of-memory daemon (systemd-oomd) and users finding their web browser being killed when facing memory or swap pressure, a change has been upstreamed in systemd to help alleviate this situation...  ( 5 min )
    Mesa's LLVMpipe Driver Begins Experimenting With AVX-512 Optimizations Ahead Of Zen 4
    An independent contributor to the open-source Mesa 3D graphics project has begun eyeing AVX-512 support by the LLVMpipe software rasterizer due to AVX-512 being present with the new AMD Ryzen 7000 series "Zen 4" processors...  ( 5 min )
    Intel's OpenGL/Vulkan Mesa Drivers Begin Properly Identifying Arc Graphics Hardware
    When currently using Intel's open-source OpenGL and Vulkan drivers on Linux with their new Arc Graphics discrete GPUs, it's simply been reported as "Intel{R} Graphics" for the product/renderer string. With the latest Mesa 22.3-devel work and for back-porting to the current stable series, the graphics card models are beginning to be properly reported...  ( 5 min )
    Steam On Linux Marketshare Crawls Up To 1.27% For August 2022
    Valve just published the Steam Survey results for August 2022 that show a slight increase to Linux gaming as part of the overall marketshare on a percentage basis...  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    YouTube algorithm pushed election fraud claims to Trump supporters, report says
    Researchers analyzed real recommendations to hundreds of YouTube users.  ( 6 min )
    Here come the bendable TVs and monitors that no one asked for
    Flat-to-curved screens have an identity crisis.  ( 6 min )
    Google launches third-party Play Store billing pilot—but only cuts fees by 4%
    It's not in the US, it's not for games, and devs will only save 4 percent.  ( 5 min )
    T-Mobile dominates 2.5 GHz spectrum auction to fill in network gaps across US
    T-Mobile spends $304 million to win over 90% of available 2.5 GHz licenses.  ( 6 min )
    EU regulators want 5 years of smartphone parts, much better batteries
    Requiring parts and manuals access part of broader environmental initiative.  ( 6 min )
    Frank Drake, astronomer famed for contributions to SETI, has died
    The equation named after him helps organize our thoughts on extraterrestrial life.  ( 5 min )
    Valve bars Steam developer who posted anti-trans rant in patch notes
    Dev demeaned a trans streamer in a post joking about a "sex change" for the game.  ( 5 min )
    I’m still worried about Diablo IV’s cosmetic-only microtransactions
    I want to find—not buy—my cool-looking loot.  ( 5 min )
    These beetles tuck symbiotic bacteria in “back pockets” during metamorphosis
    When adult females emerge from pupae, friction shuffles the bacteria to genital area.  ( 6 min )
    The Grand Cherokee 4xe is a great Jeep and a solid hybrid
    Jeep's first plug-in hybrid SUV hits the mark on ride quality, comfort.  ( 5 min )
    Rocket Report: Used Electron engine gets retested; Canadian spaceport is a go
    "We are working together with commercial space companies and growing the economy."  ( 11 min )
    Breaking down how USB4 goes where no USB standard has gone before
    USB4 vs. Thunderbolt 4—and everything else to know about the newest USB standard.  ( 4 min )
    Actors behind PyPI supply chain attack have been active since late 2021
    Group that pulled off successful attack on PyPI has humble origins.  ( 5 min )
    Cops wanted to keep mass surveillance app secret; privacy advocates refused
    Fog Reveal is "almost invisible" when attempting to search for it online.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Tveksam? Nyfiken? Sega ger oss en genomgång av Sonic Frontiers i videoform
    8 november är det skarpt läge.  ( 6 min )
    Skandal!? Quidditch blir inte spelbart i Hogwarts Legacy
    God dag kvastskaft.  ( 6 min )
    Det här spelar FZ i helgen - vad spelar du?
    No content preview  ( 7 min )
    Nästa vecka får vi veta vad som "väntar härnäst" för Cyberpunk 2077
    Luktar det expansion?  ( 6 min )
    Diskutera - Vilket kommande spel längtar du mest efter?
    Sjung ut!  ( 6 min )
    Titan Station - svensk rymdretro som sneglar på Firewatch
    Premiär i november.  ( 7 min )
    Game Pass Friends & Family avtäckt - 5 konton för 22 euro i månaden
    Men osäkert när tjänsten släpps i Sverige.  ( 7 min )
    Få en gameplay-genomgång av den tropiska världen i Tchia
    Phil Crifo visar vad spelet går ut på.  ( 7 min )
    Hogwarts Legacy-videor ger oss en titt på elevhemmens boningar
    Och några andra ikoniska platser i slotet med omnejd.  ( 7 min )
    Destroy All Humans 2: Reprobed
    Prisa den allsmäktige Arkvoodle! Crypto är tillbaka, men vill vi verkligen ha mer av hans massmordsfilosofi och sexistiska humor?  ( 8 min )
    E-sport blir en del av årets Finnkamp
    Finnarna ska tydligen få stryk i CS:GO, Dota 2, Rocket League och Tekken 7.  ( 6 min )
    Assassin's Creed Mirage har officiellt tillkännagivits
    Och Ubisoft ska visa upp det på riktigt inom kort.  ( 6 min )
    Halo Infinites utlovade splitscreen co-op-läge har skrotats
    Men co-op online såväl som Forge-läget kommer i november.  ( 7 min )
  • Open

    Untitled
    No content preview  ( 2 min )
  • Open

    Stellaris: Toxoids Species Pack coming with a free update on September 20
    Paradox Interactive has announced some more goodies coming for Stellaris with the Toxoids Species Pack and a free update landing on September 20th.  ( 5 min )
    Splitgate development is over, as the devs move onto their next game
    Splitgate, the first-person shooter with portals, is no longer getting actively developed as the developer has seemingly given up with it to move onto a new game.  ( 4 min )
    Move over Wordle, I'm all about Farmbound now
    Is the hype of Wordle over yet? Okay good. Need something new to try each day? Why not take a little look over at Farmbound.  ( 4 min )
    [I] Doesn't Exist: AI Breathes New Life Into Text Adventures
    [I] Doesn’t Exist is an up-and coming text-based game by LUAL Games that will combine old-school adventuring with modern design, most notably a narrative AI that promises to smooth out the player experience.  ( 6 min )
    OBS Studio 28.0 rolled out with HDR, 10-bit, Qt 6 and more
    OBS Studio is the free and open source video content creation kit for livestreaming and recording. Probably the best software in the world for it and OBS Studio 28.0 is out now.  ( 4 min )
    dbrand reveal the full details of Project Killswitch for Steam Deck
    After waiting quite some time, Project Killswitch from dbrand for the Steam Deck is finally coming but there's been a few changes and it seems not everyone is happy with it.  ( 5 min )
    Steam Deck Client Beta updated with Mode Shift support in Steam Input
    Valve continues tweaking and improving the Steam Deck software both the Steam Client and SteamOS. A new Beta is available with more improvements to Steam Input.  ( 4 min )
    Get a free copy of Immortal Redneck during The GOG Sale Finale
    The GOG Sale Finale is on and another game is being given away. This time it's Immortal Redneck, a pretty good FPS set in Egypt with rogue-lite elements.  ( 4 min )
    Linux user share on Steam continues the slow climb, SteamOS hits top
    Another month has finished and the Steam Hardware & Software Survey has been refreshed. It shows once again that the Linux user share has risen.  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Men Of War 2's tactics are impressively complex, but still accessible to a war newbie
    At Gamescom I sat down with a lovely ice cold beer and two lovely lads who ran me through military real-time tactics sequel Men Of War II in a 45-minute hands-off presentation. As a total freshman to the series, I was a little intimidated by the prospect of sinking my feet into the trenches of a dense strategy bonanza, especially as things kicked off with a literal history lesson. But after watching and absorbing one of the game's early missions, I can genuinely say that I'd be confident enough to give it a go when it comes out. Even perhaps, confident enough to say that I'd genuinely enjoy it quite a bit as a total newbie. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Northern Journey's surreal world deserves to be experienced, not merely described
    Oh my goodness, what a creepy, funny, and odd game Northern Journey is. I almost don't want to say any more about it, not because it can be spoiled but because it seems appropriately respectful. Not in a reverent sense, you understand. It just feels like such a world should be preserved, even slightly feared, rather than trampled on by some idiot with a camera in her face. To call Northern Journey "retro" would completely misrepresent it. It's beautiful in an ugly, desolate way reminiscent of Kenshi or Morrowind. It's translucent in its exposition but not obtuse, hostile, or obnoxiously hard. It's a bit clunky, without that ever undermining the experience. It's vaguely amateurish, yet almost consciously so, like a painter who knows their talent and intent is enough to overcome any technical flaws. This is a bloody treat and I'm so glad I got to play it. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Real-time tactics sequel Men Of War 2 delayed due to the war in Ukraine
    Real-time tactics game Men Of War 2 has been pushed to 2023 to incorporate more features and content sparked by feedback from closed playtests. Developers Best Way and publishers Fulqrum say the impact of having to pause development because of the outbreak of war in Best Way’s home country of Ukraine has led them to take extra time on the game for these to be implemented. Watch the latest trailer below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Vampire Survivors lets you play as a question mark thanks to today's surprise patch
    So two weeks ago I let you know that Vampire Survivors wouldn’t be getting any more patches before it launched into its 1.0 version. The cheeky scamps at poncle have only gone and made me look like a right sausage today, surprise announcing another patch. This time, they’re adding in a new game mode, quick start, and a very odd new character. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Publishers PQube accused of withholding money by a second studio
    Another indie developer has come forward publicly with allegations that UK-based publishers PQube have withheld money from them. Thai dev team Corecell claim they’ve only seen some of the minimum guaranteed money agreed when they signed the European console publishing rights to their action-puzzle game AeternoBlade 2 over to PQube in 2019. Corecell say they attempted to resolve things with PQube but that didn’t work, and they had to terminate the publishing agreement in 2020. Since then, Corecell have tried to regain the rights to AeternoBlade 2 from PQube to no avail. Corecell allege that PQube did offer to return the rights to the game, but only if they would agree to keep the situation secret. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Logitech G502 X review: two clicks forward, one scroll back
    Statistically, there’s a good chance you clicked onto this page with a Logitech G502 mouse. Between its Proteus Spectrum and refreshed Hero models, the G502 has sold boatloads, and was voted as RPS readers’ favourite gaming mouse in both 2019 and 2021. Not undeservedly either, as it’s sat atop our best gaming mouse rankings for years. Making more drastic improvements to it wouldn’t therefore seem like a pressing priority, but Logitech have had a crack regardless with the new G502 X series. There’s a trio of redesigned rodents in this family: the standard G502 X I’ve got on review here, the wireless G502 X Lightspeed, and the G502 X Plus, which is essentially the G502 X Lightspeed with added RGB lighting. Since prices max out at £150 / $160 for the G502 X Plus, the two Lightspeed-equipped mice could be less expensive alternatives to Razer’s new DeathAdder V3 Pro and Basilisk V3 Pro – but as the cheapest and most direct successor the G502 Hero, it’s the G502 X that’s likely to see the most desk action. Does it deserve to? Read more  ( 18 min )
    The Hexagroove dev's new 90s musical puzzler Backbeat is a puzzle game with XCOM strategy mashups
    First impressions can be interesting. I didn’t know what to expect when I met David Ventura at the Backbeat booth, after a long opening day of the weekend-long Japanese indie gaming event BitSummit. I knew of his work - now the CEO of his self-founded studio Ichigoichie with developers based both in Japan and Sweden, Ventura has had his hands in a number of highly-influential rhythm games over the course of his career. This includes work on Gitaroo Man and Elite Beat Agents during his time in Japan at iNiS, having worked at the studio for a decade before moving to Sweden to work outside of games on educational music software. In 2018 he returned to games by founding Ichigoichie (stylised as 151A). Their first game, Hexagroove, blended strategy, rhythm and educational tools for a game that captured the building blocks of being a DJ. Ventura was at BitSummit to showcase the successor to this game, Backbeat. It’s a bit of a departure from much of his past work, acting more like a puzzle game with a musical soul, albeit one where the act of creating and playing music together is imbued into every solution. As the crowd began to leave the bustling convention hall for the day, I went to the booth for one last demo, and the chance to speak to the person behind it all… who was sat at his demo kiosk playing the keytar. Read more  ( 21 min )
    Gizmo, the cutest Gremlin, is MultiVersus' next fighter
    After teasing a reveal for Warner Bros’ licensed brawler MultiVersus earlier this week, devs Player First Games have revealed that Gizmo from kids horror film Gremlins will be the game’s next fighter. Gizmo is the original gremlin, and the sweetest, but you still wouldn’t want to mess with the little fellow. He’ll arrive on Tuesday, ahead of the already announced Stripe, Gremlins' big (small) bad. Read more  ( 17 min )
    You Have To Burn The Rope and more classic Flash games are playable in your browser again
    Many archival and emulation projects are underway to preserve the wonderful history of Flash games, and best of all are those which try to recreate the original experience: just clicking a link then playing a game inside your browser. Now one unofficial Flash Player emulator is adding support for more classic games, ones made in the (relatively) newfangled ActionScript 3 language. So you can party like it's 2008 by heading over to Newgrounds and playing You Have To Burn The Rope again, as well as Wonderputt and a handful of others. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Grim Guardians: Demon Purge is an upcoming Castlevania-like with intriguing co-op
    Inti Creates have earned themselves a reputation in recent years, through titles like Blaster Master Zero and the Azure Striker Gunvolt series, of creating visually-intricate and technical 2D platformers. Their games scratch the nostalgic itch while not reverting to the technical problems and gameplay hurdles that we’ve long since moved beyond. Part of what makes Gunvolt appealing is that it refines and expands upon a formula we see in the Mega Man X series, and it’s a similar intent that defines the company’s approach to their latest project, Grim Guardians: Demon Purge. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Halo Infinite’s fresh batch of delays and cancellations spells the end for promised couch co-op
    Halo series stewards 343 Industries have given a rather sombre update on the state of Halo Infinite’s future, and there’s a lot of delays and cancellations. The game’s campaign network co-op, season 3 of multiplayer, and Forge mode have been pushed back, and couch co-op outright cancelled. And if there’s one thing about Halo that you don’t mess with then it would seem that’s couch co-op. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Assassin’s Creed: Mirage is real, and we’ll find out more next week
    Leaked Assassin’s Creed game Mirage is real, Ubisoft have confirmed, and they’re planning to show more of it at next week’s Ubisoft Forward event. All we know for sure so far is that the game exists, it’s definitely called Mirage, and returns to the Middle Eastern setting of the original Assassin’s Creed. I rather like the blue highlights to the assassin’s robes in this one. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Kitsune: The Journey Of Adashino is a Japanese fantasy world of yokai and mystery
    As indie developers from Japan and around the world descended upon the former Japanese capital of Kyoto for Bitsummit 2022, some developers present at the event were showcasing their games a little closer to home. Having already been hyped up amongst Japanese games outlets for its unique visuals and inspirations from Japanese yokai and folk tales, Kitsune: The Journey Of Adashino was a rather hot ticket at the event, and with an English localisation and a release in 2023 or 2024 planned, it stands with the opportunity to shine a light on the Japanese indie gaming scene. While it may perhaps be reductive to make a Studio Ghibli comparison to the game’s opening moments, the familiarity many have with those films compared to Japanese folklore makes the equivalence an easy one. My time with the demo was from a moment early in the game, when you’ve already set foot into this new world but don't have much knowledge about the yokai-infested supernatural surprises that await you. Read more  ( 17 min )
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    Fredagspanelen 265: Ryzen 7000 avtäckt och ännu fler böjbara OLED-skärmar
    Noelia är tillbaka från semestern och kastas därför in i första bästa panel för att diskutera veckans händelser i hårdvaruvärlden.  ( 5 min )
    USB 4 uppdateras med fler namn och hastighet om 80 Gbps
    När standarden för USB 4 uppdateras plockar USB Promoter Group upp USB-IF:s mantel och kombinerar skyhöga hastigheter med fler förvillande versionsnummer.  ( 6 min )
    Moderskeppet fullbokat – 300 spel- och teknikfantaster på kryssning
    Höstens stora höjdpunkt Moderskeppet samlar det bästa från SweClockers och FZ på en härlig dygnskryssning. Nu står det klart att biljetterna redan tagit slut.  ( 6 min )
    Moderskeppet samlar 300 spel- och teknikfantaster på kryssning
    Höstens stora höjdpunkt Moderskeppet samlar det bästa från SweClockers och FZ på en härlig dygnskryssning. Nu står det klart att biljetterna redan tagit slut.  ( 6 min )
    Corsair integrerar belysning från Philips Hue i mjukvaran ICUE
    Inom kort kommer det gå att lägga till Philips Hue-bryggor i mjukvaran ICUE för att styra och synkronisera belysningen ihop med Corsairs övriga produkter.  ( 5 min )
    Netflix reklamabonnemang väntas lanseras i november
    Netflix indikerar att företaget ska försöka möta Disney+ genom att göra sitt reklamfinansierade abonnemang tillgängligt tidigare än väntat.  ( 5 min )
    ARM stämmer Qualcomm för licensbrott
    Qualcomms satsningar på PC- och serversegmentet stöter på patrull, då ARM menar att licenser tilldelade förvärvet Nuvia inte är giltiga längre.  ( 6 min )
    AMD: "Minnesfrekvensen 6 000 MHz optimal för Ryzen 7000"
    AMD bekräftar att DDR5 i 6 000 MHz ger användare bäst balans mellan pris, prestanda och stabilitet. Samtidigt delas nya riktlinjer för Infinity Fabric-inställningar.  ( 6 min )
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    Kunal Mehta: Kiwix in Debian, 2022 update
    Previous updates: 2018, 2021 Kiwix is an offline content reader, best known for distributing copies of Wikipedia. I have been maintaining it in Debian since 2017. This year most of the work has been keeping all the packages up to date in anticipation of next year's Debian 12 Bookworm release, including several transitions for new libzim and libkiwix versions. libzim: 6.3.0 → 8.0.0 zim-tools: 2.1.0 → 3.1.1 python-libzim: 0.0.3 → 1.1.1 (with a cherry-picked patch) libkiwix: 9.4.1 → 11.0.0 (with DFSG issues fixed!) kiwix-tools: 3.1.2 → 3.3.0 kiwix (desktop): 2.0.5 → 2.2.2 The Debian Package Tracker makes it really easy to keep an eye on all Kiwix-related packages. All of the "user-facing" packages (zim-tools, kiwix-tools, kiwix) now have very basic autopkgtests that can provide a bit of confidence that the package isn't totally broken. I recommend reading the "FAQ for package maintainers" to learn about all the benefits you get from having autopkgtests. Finally, back in March I wrote a blog post, How to mirror the Russian Wikipedia with Debian and Kiwix, which got significant readership (compared to most posts on this blog), including being quoted by LWN! We are always looking for more contributors, please reach out if you're interested. The Kiwix team is one of my favorite groups of people to work with and they love Debian too.  ( 1 min )
    John Goerzen: Dead USB Drives Are Fine: Building a Reliable Sneakernet
    “OK,” you’re probably thinking. “John, you talk a lot about things like Gopher and personal radios, and now you want to talk about building a reliable network out of… USB drives?” Well, yes. In fact, I’ve already done it. What is sneakernet? Normally, “sneakernet” is a sort of tongue-in-cheek reference to using disconnected storage to transport data or messages. By “disconnect storage” I mean anything like CD-ROMs, hard drives, SD cards, USB drives, and so forth. There are times when loading up 12TB on a device and driving it across town is just faster and easier than using the Internet for the same. And, sometimes you need to get data to places that have no Internet at all. Another reason for sneakernet is security. For instance, if your backup system is online, and your systems be…
  • Open

    Comic for 2022.09.02 - Only 209 Kids Will Get This
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )
  • Open

    First Internet Interaction
    No content preview  ( 1 min )

  • Open

    Lenovo announces consumer AR glasses that can tether to iPhones
    Lenovo dangles a platform-agnostic carrot in front of AR hopefuls.  ( 6 min )
    State forces Frontier to stop charging $7 “Internet Infrastructure Surcharge”
    Users won't get refunds for hidden fee, but deal in Conn. imposes other conditions.  ( 6 min )
    NASA will pay Boeing more than twice as much as SpaceX for crew seats
    "I don't know whether the business case closes today."  ( 7 min )
    Hands-on: Lenovo’s second foldable PC addresses the first’s biggest problems
    A bigger screen, better specs, and more fitting OS could finally make foldable PCs a thing.  ( 6 min )
    Microsoft finds TikTok vulnerability that allowed one-click account compromises
    Flaw resided in the app's deeplink verification process.  ( 5 min )
    19th century art form revived to make tactile science graphics for blind people
    "Everything I can see with my eyes, a person who is blind can feel with their fingers."  ( 5 min )
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    Dell's XPS 13 Plus Has an Adhesive Problem: Screen May Fall Off
    Some of Dell's XPS 13 Plus notebooks with OLED displays have a screen panel glue problem.  ( 63 min )
    Nvidia's GeForce RTX 4080 Allegedly Exposed
    Alleged GeForce RTX 4080: Huge cooler, strange fonts, new fan.  ( 60 min )
    Cooler Master’s Vertical GPU Mount Is More Expensive Than Its Cases
    Cooler Master has unveiled two new computer chassis and a very expensive vertical GPU mount adapter with an extensive amount of flexibility.  ( 64 min )
    Micron's $15 Billion Memory Fab in Idaho to Come Online by 2030
    Micron announces new leading-edge memory fab in Idaho, coming online by 2030.  ( 60 min )
    Intel Arc A380 Review: Great for Video, Weak for Gaming
    We've done extensive testing with the Intel Arc A380, a graphics card with plenty of delays and a problematic launch. The latest drivers help, and Intel's video encoding options are ahead of everyone else, but most people should probably look elsewhere.  ( 64 min )
    Intel’s Core i7-12700KF Reduced to a New Low of $321: Real Deals
    It's that time of year when we anticipate the release of the next generation of PC tech, and also a great time to start picking up some deals. Today Intel's Core i7-12700KF is down to a low of $321 on Amazon.  ( 66 min )
    Optical Discs at $5 per TB? Folio Photonics Attempts a New Spin
    1TB disks (in 10TB caddies) are aimed at enterprises, and won't be ready until 2024.  ( 60 min )
    USB 4 Version 2.0 Announced With 80 Gbps of Bandwidth
    USB 4 version 2.0 has just been announced with incredibly speeds of up to 80Gbps.  ( 59 min )
    Best Gaming Laptops of 2022
    Here are our favorite gaming laptops for every need, based on our testing and reviews.  ( 75 min )
    DDR5 Price Set to ‘Substantially’ Narrow Gap With DDR4 in Coming Months
    With more DDR5 chips on the market, the price is likely to drop.  ( 60 min )
    SSD Pricing Could Tumble as NAND Prices Predicted to Drop by 35%
    TrendForce has revised down its NAND flash wafer contract price estimates from 15-20 to 30-35% during Q3 2022. It expects prices to dip a further 20% in Q4 this year.  ( 60 min )
    Zen 4 EPYC's New Naming Scheme Leaked
    A new post has revealed the new naming scheme for AMD's upcoming Zen 4 and Zen 4c EPYC server processors.  ( 61 min )
    U.S. GPU Export Restrictions Hit AMD, China's Tech Giants
    New high-performance GPU export rules to China affect AMD and China's multi-billion high-tech companies.  ( 60 min )
    Best Gaming Mouse: Top Mice for 2022
    Up your game with the best gaming mouse for your grip.  ( 86 min )
    Seasonic Prime TX-1600 Power Supply Review
    The Seasonic Prime TX-1600 is one of the best PSUs, money can get you today.  ( 70 min )
    Gigabyte B660M Aorus Pro AX DDR4 Review: Frugal Falcon?
    The Gigabyte B660M Aorus Pro AX is a generally well-appointed motherboard with a black-on-grey aesthetic. There are plenty of USB ports on the rear IO, but the performance was slower in some heavily multi-threaded tests.  ( 67 min )
    Lenovo's New ThinkPad X1 Fold Goes Bigger
    The Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Fold has been reimagined with a 16.3-inch display, a new design and more powerful processors.  ( 64 min )
    Lenovo Legion Y32p-30 32-inch 144Hz 4K Gaming Monitor Debuts
    Lenovo’s Legion Y32p-30 boast a 4K 144Hz panel with FreeSync Premium support.  ( 59 min )
    Lenovo Jammed a 1080p Display Into Glasses, And I'm Not Sure About It
    The Lenovo Glasses T1 create a virtual monitor to work with your phone or PC.  ( 60 min )
    AMD Confirms DDR5-6000 RAM Is The Sweet Spot For Ryzen 7000 CPUs
    Robert Hallock, the Director of Technical Marketing at AMD, shares details about the best memory settings on the latest Ryzen 7000 Zen 4 processors.  ( 59 min )
    U.S. Export Rules May Cost Nvidia $400 Million, Prevent Completion of H100 Development
    U.S. government now requires Nvidia to obtain a license to sell A100, A100X, and H100-based products to China.  ( 60 min )
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    Sonic Frontiers' new three-minute explainer video is probably how Sega should have started
    It's fair to say that eyebrows were both raised and furrowed when Sega first shared footage of Sonic Frontiers back in June, but its latest trailer - a three-minute overview video breaking down the various features and gameplay flow of Sonic's latest adventure - offers the clearest explanation yet of how things will unfold come its launch on 8th November if you're still a little puzzled by the whole thing. Granted, Sega's plentiful, if scattershot, drip-feed of information over the last few months means none of the information in today's trailer is particularly new, but it's certainly more digestible - and understandable - than trying to mentally scoop together a picture of Sonic Frontiers from countless previews and reveals. The gist, then, is that having somehow found his way into a strange dimension known as Cyber Space, Sonic escapes to Kronos - one of the Starfall Islands where players will be able to embark on Frontiers' non-linear "open zone" gameplay. Here, high-speed exploration and puzzling are the order of the day, with successful puzzling unlocking items that'll increase Sonic's power and defence and revealing new parts of each map. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Looks like Gremlins' Gizmo is joining MultiVersus next week
    Warner Bros is teasing the imminent arrival of Gremlins' adorable mogwai Gizmo to its free-to-play crossover fighter MultiVersus, with the company's announcement pointing to a release next Tuesday, 6th September. Although Warner Bros is yet to refer to Gizmo directly, a teaser trailer released today on Twitter shows a pair of very Gizmo-like hands and eyes popping out of the distinctive box used to transport the character in Gremlins and Gremlins 2: The New Batch. What makes the Gizmo tease particularly interesting is that (despite Gizmo's inclusion in the playable roster having been leaked earlier this year) the only Gremlins character so for officially confirmed for MultiVersus is Gizmo's arch-nemesis Stripe. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Stellaris' Toxoids DLC adding 'most stubborn species in game's history'
    Paradox Interactive has unveiled Toxoids, a new Species Pack DLC for Stellaris that'll bring the "most stubborn species in the game's history" when it comes to PC on 20th September. Toxoids will give players the tools to "gamble the future of their planets for immediate gains" on release, with empires featuring the new species able to grow and adapt faster than most creatures - albeit often with nasty consequences for their neighbours and themselves. To that end, the expansion introduces two new Origins: Knights of the Toxic God and Overtuned. The former revolves around a mysterious power rumoured to be buried under toxic sludge which can be unleashed on the galaxy if found, while the latter gives players the chance to play as a species able to gain more and more traits at the expense of their own lifespan. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Three years on from Lady Gaga's infamous tweet, Fortnite fans think a concert is really happening
    In October 2019, global pop sensation Lady Gaga appeared confused as to what Fortnite was. "What's fortnight?" Gaga tweeted, elliciting numerous responses. One reply, from blue-haired Fortnite streamer Ninja, asked Gaga to play with him. "who are you," was Gaga's response. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Twitch streamer dancing through Elden Ring with a dance pad
    Not content with completing Elden Ring with one hand, Twitch streamer MissMikkaa is now playing through the game on a dance pad. With all the bizarre ways of playing, this feels inevitable right? The one-handed run was already an impressive feat - especially as it was quickly followed by a one-handed level one All Remembrance run - but now she's playing with her feet instead. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Halo Infinite Season 3 delayed to March 2023, split-screen co-op canned
    343 Industries has shared its latest development roadmap, and it's not good news. The biggest news is that the game's next season has been delayed to March 2023. That's an excruciatingly long time to wait. For context, Battlefield 2042, which released around the same time and also suffered delays, is also on Season 2, with the next Season planned for the end of this year. The bad news doesn't end there, as split-screen local co-op has now been cancelled outright. "In order to improve and accelerate ongoing live service development, and to better address player feedback and quality of life updates, we have reallocated studio resources and are no longer working on local campaign split-screen co-op," 343 said in an accompany development video. Read more  ( 15 min )
    It doesn't sound like The Callisto Protocol will launch on Xbox Game Pass
    For those that had hoped to see upcoming space horror The Callisto Protocol make its way onto Xbox Games Pass at release, this seems unlikely. Chatting to TrueAchievements, Striking Distance Studios' chief technology officer Mark James said the Game Pass model was a "difficult" one in financial terms for independent studios with single-player games - something The Callisto Protocol is. "I think those services are built towards some of the open-world style and repetitive multiplayer games. I think games [like that] survive well on that service," James said when discussing the possibility of seeing a title like The Callisto Protocol joining Game Pass. Read more  ( 16 min )
    PQube under fire once more from indie developer claiming funds withheld
    Publisher PQube is under fire once again from another developer claiming funds have been withheld. Last week Coffee Talk developer Toge Productions released a statement explaining issues with the publisher that left the team "feeling manipulated and exploited". Now Corecell, the Thai developer behind AeternoBlade 2, has released a damning statement against the publisher to "help other indie game developers to avoid what has happened to us and inform our fans about our situation". Read more  ( 16 min )
    Sony claims PSVR2 will be easier for developers to port games to
    The PlayStation VR2 will be easier for developers to port the games onto, Sony has said. The comments were made by Yasuo Takahashi and Kenjo Akiyama, two senior directors at Sony Interative Entertainment, at an event during Computer Entertainment Developers Conference (CEDEC) 2022. The talk revealed new details about the software that will help developers in creating for or porting onto PSVR2 (reported by IGN). Read more  ( 15 min )
    Trans superhero Dreamer joins Fortnite as part of Rainbow Royale Pride event
    Fortnite has begun its second annual Pride event, Rainbow Royale, with a collection of free LGBTQ-themed cosmetics, and the arrival of DC's transgender superhero Dreamer. Nia Nal, otherwise known as Dreamer, debuted in the fourth season of Arrowverse series Supergirl, and was the first trans superhero in a TV show. By extension, this also makes Dreamer the first character confirmed as trans in Fortnite. Dreamer will be available via Fortnite's Item Shop later in the event, following a Zero Build Squads tournament where winners can collect the character early. Dreamer's TV actress Nicole Maines is also on board, and will be streaming Fortnite in-character next week. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The Last of Us Part 1: all performance modes tested, which should you use?
    The Last of Us on PS3 was a boundary-pushing title with stunning graphics and animation. Novel techniques - like capsule shadows and real-time bounce lighting - alongside ruthless attention to detail produced one of the most technically accomplished games in its time, even though it often failed to reach its 30fps target, frequently dipping into the mid-20s in combat and traversal sequences. Enter The Last of Us Part 1. Some nine-and-a-half years after its original release, The Last of Us has been fully remade with modern technology on PS5 hardware. With an advanced suite of graphics tech in tow, does the remake also blow past its frame-time budgets? Or has Naughty Dog more sensibly balanced visual beauty with fluid frame-rates? The Last of Us Part 1 offers players five genuine visual modes, engaged through various selections and system-level tweaks. With the PS5 set to 60Hz output, you get the option of a fidelity mode that offers 4K visuals with a 30fps target framerate, alongside a performance mode that advertises dynamic 4K visuals or native 1440p visuals depending on your output resolution - but actually delivers 1440p regardless. With 120Hz engaged, you get the same options, though the fidelity mode now promises a 40fps framerate target. As an additional modifier, engaging both 120Hz and VRR gives you the option to 'unlock' the 120Hz options, maximising frame-rate and using VRR to smooth out any inconsistencies. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Grafaiai, the latest addition to Pokémon Scarlet and Violet, officially revealed
    The Pokémon Company has officially revealed the next Pokémon in Scarlet and Violet: Grafaiai. The Pokémon has been teased all week with a series of images taken by a Paldean photographer featuring brightly coloured markings in a forest. Now, in a new documentary format video, we finally got a look at the little painter. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn is a Soulslike that's not afraid of difficulty settings
    Recently we've seen a flurry of announcements and releases for Soulslike games. From the recently released Thymesia and next week's Steel Rising, through to 2023's Pinocchio inspired Lies of P it feels like everyone and their dog is jumping on the action RPG bandwagon at the moment. After watching a 15 minute, hands-off presentation last week, I can also confirm that Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn is most definitely a Soulslike action RPG too. However, this 'magic meets gunpowder technology' fantasy title seems to be a little braver than other games in the genre as it's not afraid to be releasing with optional difficulty settings. This means anyone who wants to experience Flintlock without fear of being punished by some very intense action will be able to tailor the experience to suit their skill level. During the presentation the developers, A44 Games did stress that there is a specific default difficulty for the game though, and this will allow you to maintain the authenticity of the experience and play the game as originally intended. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Upcoming RTS Men of War 2 delayed into 2023
    Men of War 2, the sequel to the original cult RTS Men of War, will now release in 2023. Developed by Ukrainian studio Best Way, this release has been delayed in order to "accommodate new features and content suggested by its fans and improve the game itself". The development team noted that, due to the ongoing effects of the war in Ukraine, these improvements would not be possible to facilitate within the original timeframe. Along with this announcement, the developer also shared a new trailer for Men of War 2. This is titled 'The Price of Victory', and can be watched below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Call of Duty will join Xbox Game Pass, but still launch on PlayStation same day
    Xbox boss Phil Spencer has issued a new blog post detailing plans for Call of Duty and other Activision Blizzard franchises, following today's announcement from the UK's Competition and Markets Authority that it will scrutinise the deal in detail. As you would expect, Call of Duty, Overwatch and Diablo will be made available via Xbox Game Pass, Spencer said, if and when Microsoft's $68bn buyout of Activision Blizzard is completed. Spencer also made the guarantee that Xbox was "committed to making the same version of Call of Duty available on PlayStation on the same day the game launches elsewhere". Read more  ( 16 min )
    UK's competition regulator to undertake in-depth investigation of Microsoft-Activision deal
    The UK's Competition and Markets Authority has concluded its initial investigation of Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard, making the decision that the deal requires a more in-depth "phase 2" investigation. In its report, the CMA has determined that the deal will be "giving rise to a realistic prospect of a substantial lessening of competition in gaming consoles, multi-game subscription services, and cloud gaming services." Crucially, the CMA decided the deal would have a large impact on the success of rival platforms: "Evidence consistently pointed towards ABK's content, especially Call of Duty, as being important and capable of making a material difference to the success of rivals' gaming platforms." Read more  ( 17 min )
    New Tchia gameplay trailer gives us a tour of the gorgeous tropical island
    A new trailer for Tchia has been released, giving us a closer look at the game's tropical, New Caledonia-inspired setting. This trailer is narrated by the game's director, Phil Crifo, and takes us from the island's high peaks to the bottom of its azure ocean. Along the way, we are shown various methods of getting around the island in action. This includes things such as Tchia catapulting herself from the tops of trees and then gliding her way through the sky. We also get another look at the game's soul-jumping ability, which allows Tchia to quickly hop into the body of almost any animal or inanimate object she can find. This proves useful when she comes across the Maano, the game's "strange fabric creatures" that have invaded Tchia's home. In this case, she becomes a lantern, before later on becoming a coconut. You can see the trailer for yourself below. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 contains some naughty stuff
    As we reach closer to Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2's October release date, national content rating boards have been reviewing the game for classification. The Australian Classification Board has jumped the gun and published its classification early, and it makes for a humorous read. The ACB warns that the game depicts "tracking and killing of numerous opponents, with resulting examples of blood and injury detail." Read more  ( 15 min )
    Steam Deck's most played game in August was Vampire Survivors
    Valve has announced the top 10 games played on Steam Deck in August, plus another milestone it has reached. Things are looking smooth for Steam Deck right now. Production is doing well, outperforming Valve's estimates, and people are finally getting their hands on a unit. To round off August, Valve has revealed the 10 most played games on Steam Deck during the month. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Looks like Biomutant will be making a Switch debut this October
    A new listing implies that Biomutant will be getting a Switch release this October. The listing, spotted by GoNintendo, can be found on Portuguese site Gaming Replay. It includes a price (54,99 €), Switch box cover art, and a release date - 25th October. While nothing has been officially announced by developer Experiment 101, a Switch edition of the game has long been rumoured to be coming eventually. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Third game in Yoko Taro's Voice of Cards series out this month
    Voice of Cards: The Beasts of Burden has a release date: 13th September across Switch, PS4 and PC (Steam). It's the third game in Square Enix's Voice of Cards series that presents a turn-based RPG entirely through cards. The series is created by NieR's Yoko Taro, which is why there's DLC for the game based on mobile game NieR Re[in]carnation. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The Xbox app is getting a major upgrade to its search
    The Xbox mobile app for iOS and Android is getting a major upgrade to its search engine. The update, which is available right now for beta users, improves the algorithm that powers game searches. Search for games on the Xbox app has been notoriously bad up until this point, igniting the console wars between PlayStation and Xbox fans since the PlayStation is relatively good at finding what you want. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Assassin's Creed Mirage artwork surfaces online
    Promotional artwork for the still-unannounced Assassin's Creed Mirage has popped up online, apparently from Ubisoft's own store. The image, shared on Twitter by Assassin's Creed fansite The Codex Network, appears to be for some kind of bonus quest. It shows a hooded Assassin hero armed with the series' iconic hidden blade weapon, facing down the silhouette of an enemy with a curved sword. Setting a story mission around the famous fable of The Forty Thieves would mirror other such bonus quests offered by Ubisoft in the past, such as a Beowulf-themed story for Assassin's Creed Valhalla. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Bomb Rush Cyberfunk delayed to 2023
    Bomb Rush Cyberfunk, the indie spiritual successor to Jet Set Radio, has been delayed until summer 2023. It was originally intended to release this year. Developer Team Reptile is taking extra time to increase the quality of the game. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Without Dungeons & Dragons, Fighting Fantasy might never have existed
    What do you think of when you hear the words "Fighting Fantasy"? Do you remember being absorbed for hours as a child, hurriedly flipping pages and rolling dice, hoping you'd chosen the right path? Perhaps you talked about it with friends in the schoolyard, swapping strategies, comparing notes. You almost certainly remembered the deaths. Whatever you remember of it, the effect the books had is undeniable. More than 20 million copies have been sold, making writers Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson best-selling authors, in addition to all of the other plaudits they've received. In fact, few people are as decorated in the games industry. And this year, Fighting Fantasy turns 40 years old, just like me. And in celebration, two new books are being released: Shadow of the Giants, by Livingstone, and Secrets of Salamonis, by Jackson. And they're coming out today - Thursday, 1st September. Read more  ( 25 min )
    Sons of the Forest delayed again, now launching in February next year
    Developer Endnight Games has announced "one last" delay for Sons of the Forest, with the horror-survival sequel now set to arrive on 23rd February next year. Sons of the Forest is the direct sequel to Endnight's well-received The Forest (which got its version 1.0 release in 2018 after four years in early access), a game that combined the survival genre's penchant for scavenging and crafting with a genuinely unnerving horror element as protagonist Eric Leblanc searched the titular, cannibal-infested forest for his son following a harrowing plane crash. Sons of the Forest, which this time sees players tracking down a missing billionaire on a remote island, was originally due to launch in May this year, but Endnight made the decision to postpone its release to October in order to deliver its "vision of the next step in survival games". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Sons of the Forest delayed again, now launching in May next year
    Developer Endnight Games has announced "one last" delay for Sons of the Forest, with the horror-survival sequel now set to arrive on 23rd May next year. Sons of the Forest is the direct sequel to Endnight's well-received The Forest (which got its version 1.0 release in 2018 after four years in early access), a game that combined the survival genre's penchant for scavenging and crafting with a genuinely unnerving horror element as protagonist Eric Leblanc searched the titular, cannibal-infested forest for his son following a harrowing plane crash. Sons of the Forest, which this time sees players tracking down a missing billionaire on a remote island, was originally due to launch in May this year, but Endnight made the decision to postpone its release to October in order to deliver its "vision of the next step in survival games". Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    Xcel smart thermostat users lose their cool after power company locks them out
    They were asking for it, energy giant says Thousands of Xcel Energy customers in Colorado this week discovered they’d been locked out of their smart thermostats, unable to adjust their air conditioning systems as local temperatures rose about well above 90°F this week.…  ( 4 min )
    Why bother with warrants when cops can buy location data for under $10k?
    How Fog Data Science sells records of your whereabouts, according to the EFF For less than $10,000, and without a warrant, cops can buy large amounts of location data on private citizens and track people's movements over long periods of time.…  ( 6 min )
    FCC awards $800m for rural broadband development
    Illinois, Arizona and Iowa are the big winners in connection plan The US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) says it's ready to disburse nearly $800 million to fund rural broadband deployments in 19 states, with Illinois, Arizona and Iowa getting just over half of the total pot. …  ( 4 min )
    Micron confirms first US memory fab on home soil in 20 years
    $15 billion Idaho facility is the first step as chip biz feeds on CHIPS Act US memory vendor Micron will spend $15 billion over the next decade to construct what it claims is the first memory fab built by a US manufacturer in America in the last 20 years.…  ( 4 min )
    One man's battle to get patent rights for AI inventors in America may be over
    Stephen Thaler is fighting the law, and the law is winning Analysis  Stephen Thaler, founder of software biz Imagination Engines, has waged a years-long campaign fighting for machines to be legally recognized as inventors around the world. Now, it looks as though his struggle may have been for nothing.…  ( 7 min )
    Twitter edit button coming later this month ... for some
    Looks like the bird site didn't need Musk's money to get the feature added, after all Twitter's long-awaited edit button is being tested internally, and in the coming weeks will be available to Twitter Blue subscribers before a wider rollout, the social media company said today. …  ( 4 min )
    California asks people not to charge EVs during heatwave
    Not a great look for the state that just vowed to phase out gas-powered cars in favor of battery-powered ones One week after announcing plans to phase out autos powered by gasoline, California energy authorities are facing a heat wave so severe residents are being asked not to charge their electric vehicles during "flex alerts" designed to reduce stress on the grid.…  ( 5 min )
    Kubuntu and Lubuntu get desktop upgrades, as optional extras
    Latest versions of the KDE Plasma and LXQt desktops now available Kubuntu and Lubuntu desktops have been upgraded but you won't automatically get the new versions. Here's how to get the optional lifts.…  ( 5 min )
    GM's Cruise revises self-driving software after San Francisco crash
    Just weeks after milestone permit to charge for robotaxi rides using autonomous-driving tech General Motors autonomous unit Cruise has issued a Safety Recall report, pulling software that governed how its AVs behave when making an unprotected left turn after one of the vehicles was involved in a crash.…  ( 6 min )
    No longer prepared to svn commit: WebKit migrates to GitHub
    Apple-developed web engine to take advantage of Git’s distributed nature, GitHub’s large community Apple-developed web rendering engine, WebKit, the basis of its Safari browser, is migrating to Git.…  ( 4 min )
    Lenovo’s folding portable ThinkPad grows to 16.3in, adds keyboard
    Affixes magnetically attached Bluetooth unit instead of soft keyboard after feedback Lenovo has exhibited an updated version of its ThinkPad X1 Fold portable, a device that is a mash-up of a folding-screen tablet and a Windows laptop, with a sleeker, slimmer design sporting Intel's 12th-gen Core processors and Windows 11.…  ( 5 min )
    Underwater datacenter will open for business this year
    Subsea Cloud boasts 1MW of capacity for up to 90% lower costs compared to landlubber facilities A company called Subsea Cloud is planning to have a commercially available undersea datacenter operating off the coast of the US before the end of 2022, with other deployments planned for the Gulf of Mexico and the North Sea.…  ( 5 min )
    Inflation to kill growth prospects for smartphone sales
    Buy a new phone or pay food and household energy bills? Shipments to crash in 2022 Smartphone shipments are forecast to shrink globally by 6.5 percent this year as many households feeling the pinch of inflation decide to prioritize paying for food, energy and other essentials over refreshing handsets.…  ( 4 min )
    Merge requests and insecure GitHub workflows may lead to supply-chain attacks
    Starting with Google Firebase and Apache Camel repos Security researchers at Legit Security identified vulnerabilities in the GitHub automated workflows used by Google Firebase and Apache Camel that could have been abused to compromise those open-source projects through their GitHub CI/CD pipeline and insert malicious code.…  ( 5 min )
    Here's how 5 mobile banking apps put 300,000 users' digital fingerprints at risk
    Spoiler: They used hard-coded AWS credentials Massive amounts of private data – including more than 300,000 biometric digital fingerprints used by five mobile banking apps – have been put at risk of theft due to hard-coded Amazon Web Services credentials, according to security researchers.…  ( 6 min )
    Astronaut blood reveals genetic mutations for cancer and heart disease
    Could just be a coincidence ... let's keep going into space and see what happens Analyses of blood taken before and after spaceflight have confirmed astronauts undergo genetic mutations that could make them more susceptible to developing cancer and heart disease.…  ( 5 min )
    Goodbye, humans: Call centers 'could save $80b' switching to AI
    You'll just have to learn to code instead – oh wait, computers can do that, too By 2026 the call center industry could save up to $80 billion by replacing humans with AI chatbots, according to analysts at Gartner.…  ( 5 min )
    Oh no, that James Webb Space Telescope snap might actually contain malware
    Is nothing sacred? Scumbags are using a photo from the James Webb Space Telescope to smuggle Windows malware onto victims' computers – albeit in a roundabout way.…  ( 5 min )
    Braking news: Cops slammed for spamming Waze to make drivers slow down
    You're under app-vest, sunshine Traffic cops in Surrey, England, have drawn criticism after revealing how they game Waze to spook drivers into slowing down while out on patrol.…  ( 5 min )
    US bars Nvidia and AMD from selling AI-centric accelerators to China and Russia
    Makes Nvidia tense with ban on Tensor tech that could cost it $400m this quarter alone As part of ongoing efforts to restrict China and Russia accessing advanced American technology, the US government last week banned AMD and NVIDIA from selling some AI kit to China.…  ( 5 min )
    LabMD gets another shot at defamation claim against 'extortionate' infosec biz
    But keep your attorney on a 'short leash' against Tiversa, court warns LabMD, the embattled and now defunct cancer-testing company, will get another chance at suing security firm Tiversa for defamation following an appeals court ruling. …  ( 6 min )
    FBI: Look out, crooks stole $1.3b in cryptocurrency in just three months this year
    DeFi, as in, defying belief The FBI has urged people to be cautious and heavily research a DeFi – decentralized finance – provider before putting your money into it, after more than a billion dollars was stolen from these providers in three months.…  ( 6 min )
    Green alert: SaaS giants may use sustainability to justify price hikes
    Which should make you see red because using renewable energy is supposed to cut their costs SaaS vendors plan to hike prices by between 15 and 20 percent in the next three years, and one of the justifications they’ll use is the cost of their environmental sustainability programs – despite expectations that those efforts would lower their costs.…  ( 4 min )
    VMware customers optimistically wait for Broadcom’s impact
    As vCEO Raghu Raghuram tells us Big B won’t treat VMware like its other slash and burn acquisitions VMware Explore  VMware customers are waiting to see what changes Broadcom will bring to the virtualization giant, with many optimistic the impact will be positive.…  ( 5 min )
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    This Sonic Frontiers video provides an overview of the game
    SEGA has released a new video for Sonic Frontiers that provides an overview of the game. The video shows all sorts of gameplay, and the narration provides plenty of details regarding Sonic's latest adventure. In Sonic Frontiers, our blue hero is searching for the Chaos emeralds. While on this adventure, he becomes stranded on an ancient island teeming with unusual creatures. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Halo Infinite winter roadmap has Forge and Campaign co-op down for November
    343 Industries has provided a new roadmap for Halo Infinite that notes Forge and Campaign co-op will arrive in November with the winter update. While that is good news, there's some bad to go along with it: split-screen co-op has been canceled. Forge allows you to build maps using a special editor, and you can share your creations with other players. Forge will be available in beta form on November 8. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Ubisoft announces Assassin's Creed Mirage, more information coming September 10
    Assassin's Creed Mirage has been announced by Ubisoft. Confirmation comes via tweet after artwork for the game leaked earlier today. Today's leak follows previous information on the game which slipped out ahead of time, such as the game's setting, character, and timeframe. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Rocket League season 8 goes live September 7, with a new car, arena, and more!
    It’s that time again, Rocket League fans. Season 8 is almost here, going live September 7 following an in-game update the previous day at 4PM PDT. This season is bringing the Honda Civic Type R as the first real life car present in a seasonal battle pass, a new arena, a returning event and of course a new pass for players to progress through. According to the Urban Dictionary, a Civic driver is “A usually white and slightly poor male who wears flat-brimmed hats or beanies, has tattoos and an ego larger then the federal deficit”. Having seen people matching this description out in the wild in the UK, this car is the perfect addition for a certain portion of the Rocket League community. Better yet, this is the Type R version, which can only be a good thing. In game, it has a Octane hitbox. Read more  ( 16 min )
    On paper, Xbox’s Gamescom show was nothing to shout about. But in person, it showcased the power of Game Pass
    This year’s Gamescom was a strange one. The first year back after the pandemic, many of gaming’s biggest publishers decided to skip the show – which had the welcome effect of shining a brighter spotlight on many games and publishers that usually might have to jostle with the bigger multinational corporations for attention. French publisher Focus Home Interactive, previously best known for games like A Plague Tale and Vampyr, had the best line-up of the show. But another beneficiary of the no-shows was undoubtedly Xbox. The only one of the ‘big three’ to show up, Xbox had ‘won’ the Gamescom hardware manufacturer competition before the show had even begun. But even then, I looked upon its line-up for the show with my brow furrowed. Is this it? This is a paltry offering. Not even a crumb of Starfield? But now I must hold my hands up. Mea culpa – I was wrong. It was a great line-up – for what it was. Sure enough, it didn’t have the big-name announcements you might most desire. The biggest first-party games down on the Xbox stand were simply updates to existing rolling service games like Sea of Thieves and Grounded. The booth was dominated by attention-grabbing, line-up distracting photo ops. And, bluntly, there were a laughable number of stations to play – if you managed to get on anything in that stand during the public visiting hours, you were very lucky indeed. Read more  ( 18 min )
    MultiVersus has one huge advantage over Super Smash Bros
    I’ll never forget when Super Smash Bros. Ultimate crash landed into my life. To be frank, things got a little bit out of hand, and shortly after launch, my work friends and I were often staying for hours at the end of the day to battle it out. Lunch times were completely consumed by it, we even organised tournaments at local bars so that we would never have to stop playing. Eight-players, as many items as possible, and game after game of exquisitely-designed party brawler fun. When I look back on these times however, it’s not all Mario Sunshine and Rainbow Roads. No matter how brilliant, just how completely perfect Super Smash Bros. Ultimate felt in a group, there was always the looming presence of Super Smash Bros. at home. Anyone who’s played Super Smash Bros. Ultimate alone online will know it’s an absolutely miserable experience. Even though I’d confidently rank Super Smash Bros. Ultimate among my favourite games ever made, the frequently laggy and downright ancient online capabilities make it a game of two sides. As the pandemic brought down a hammer on in-person meetups and shattered any hopes of LAN parties across the world, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate became a chore to even open, and after a while I simply put it down. I’ve no doubt that if the online actually functioned, I’d probably still be playing every single day, if only for a game or two. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Two Point Campus hits 1 million player milestone two weeks after release
    SEGA and Two Point Studios have announced that university management sim Two Point Campus surpassed the 1 million players mark within two weeks of release. "Two Point Campus was such a thrill to create, so we’re ecstatic to see so many people enjoying the game as much as they do,” said Mark Webley, studio director. “We had high hopes that we had created something that fans would love, but the response has exceeded all expectations. We’d like to send a massive thank you to all of the players who are showing support by building their wild and wonderful campuses – we can’t wait to see what more you’ll create.” Read more  ( 16 min )
    Tekken 7 has a substantial cheating problem – can Bandai Namco fix it in time for Tekken 8?
    Tekken 7 has a substantial cheating problem, and it’s been a major blemish on an otherwise excellent fighter ever since it was released back in 2015. With the tease of a new Tekken project shown off during Evo, and the transition from this fan-favourite 3D brawler to something fresh in the foreseeable future, there’s a substantial worry that Tekken 7 will be left in the lurch forever. To find out as much about the cheating situation in Tekken 7, we reached out to professional players, content creators, and ordinary Tekken enthusiasts to learn their experiences with the online experience, what forms of cheating are present, and how they hope future instalments of Tekken will battle these issues. To start, it’s important to break down what ‘cheating’ actually means in the context of Tekken 7. When most people think of cheats in modern multiplayer titles, they think of exterior programs that provide a distinct advantage over other players with the most infamous examples being aimbots and wall hacks in FPS titles. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Another Indie developer has come forward with claims of PQube mistreatment
    Another series of allegations have been levied against UK-based indie game publisher PQube. This time, claims of mistreatment come from Corecell Technologies, who had their indie action title Aeterno Blade 2 published in Europe by PQube back in 2019. According to an official post made by Corecell Technologies only a few minutes ago, Corecell claims that PQube has “only paid a small part of the minimum guarantee of the signing milestone by the time we sent them the game and they never paid the remaining milestones”. A minimum guarantee, generally speaking in the context of video game marketing and publishing, is an agreed upon sum of money that a publisher will pay to the developer of a game over the course of the partnership. It’s a minimum guarantee of funds, that is meant to go to the devs as they meet certain development milestones. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Grafaiai is a new Pokemon coming to Pokemon Scarlet and Violet , and it likes to spit poison
    A new Pokemon has been revealed for the upcoming Pokemon Scarlet and Violet. Called Grafaiai, the toxic monkey Pokemon is a Normal/Poison-type with the abilities Unburden and Poison Touch. It apparently likes to claim territory by painting trees in the area. How this works is the nocturnal Pokemon licks its hands and fingers to cover them in poison. It then uses this poison paint on the trees, which in turn paralyzes Bug Pokemon drawn to the saliva’s sweet, fragrant scent. Read more  ( 15 min )
    A Plague Tale: Requiem will easily take the title of this year's most harrowing Xbox Game Pass game
    A Plague Tale: Innocence was a breakout hit: it came from pretty much nowhere, infested the minds of gamers the world over, and gnawed through any preconceptions of what everyone thought would be just another stealth game’. Asobo Studio picked up accolades ranging from best narrative, best art direction and studio of the year – as well as a slew of Game of the Year awards – for its sleeper hit effort with the first game in the series. And rightly so; rarely do we see stories so affecting, so artfully done, and so sublimely grotesque… all at the same time. So, following up with A Plague Tale: Requiem was never going to be an easy feat. Asobo wasn’t even sure if it’d get to make a sequel to the game whilst the original was in development – and that’s probably for the best. It means the original story wasn’t chopped up, butchered, and Frankenstein’d back together for the sake of a sequel. It means that each game retains its own identity, its own outlook, and its own take on where storytelling and mechanics intersect. It means that Requiem, from what we’ve seen so far, is even more harrowing than its predecessor. From a top-down view, Requiem is very much more of the same: high fidelity graphics, an emphasis on stealth, deep and unsettling horror thumbed into every pore of the game. Wherever you do, there’s the chattering of rats and the pungent smell of death – this is a world where Europe is still in the grips of a heaving infestation, after all. Your actions in the last game haven’t solved the vermin epidemic. But where the first game made you feel underpowered and vulnerable, just children trying to survive in a world utterly hostile to life, Requiem makes you the threat – in some quietly horrifying ways. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Artwork reportedly from Assassin’s Creed Mirage leaks
    Some artwork purportedly from the rumored Assassin's Creed Mirage has surfaced online. Reportedly pulled from the Ubisoft Store, the image shows the back of a person wearing assassin's garb, and we presume this person is Basim from Assassin's Creed Valhalla, as rumored. The leak (thanks, RPS) comes from Assassin’s Creed community The Codex Network, which credited Synth Potato for providing the image, which was also shared by leaker ScriptLeaksR6. Some accounts removed the image due to DMCA notices. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Call of Duty, Diablo, and Overwatch will come to Game Pass
    Microsoft intends to add Activision Blizzard’s library of games to Game Pass, particularly Call of Duty, Diablo, and Overwatch. That's according to an open letter discussing the Activision Blizzard acquisition penned by Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer. "Subscription services like Game Pass make gaming more affordable and help players from all over the world find their next favorite game," said Spencer. "Game Pass empowers developers to bring more games to more players, not fewer. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Nintendo Direct September 2022 rumours suggest big news for Zelda fans
    Just yesterday, a rumour emerged that the next Nintendo Direct is much closer than you might’ve though, and it’s going to be packed with news for keen Zelda fans. This report comes directly from Giant Bomb’s Jeff Grubb in a recent stream to YouTube. In the video, Grubb suggests that a Nintendo Direct could be happening the week of September 12, which is the same week that the Tokyo Game Show is expected to begin – this does track, given that we have seen a Nintendo Direct every September since the launch of the Nintendo Switch in 2017. When it comes to what this rumoured Nintendo Direct will feature, Grubb suggests that “I think there’s going to be a lot of Zelda stuff at this thing.” More specifically, it’s believed that Wind Waker HD and Twilight Princess HD ports could very well be coming to Nintendo Switch soon. These titles have been rumoured before, and are also very much titles that fans want to see on the newer console. Read more  ( 16 min )
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    A boat-load of Blue Microphones are discounted in the UK
    There are a ton of Blue Microphones on sale at Amazon UK at the moment, as part of their 'gaming week' promotion. As well as the Yeti and Snowball USB microphones that are most likely to be familiar to you, there's also a rare 42% discount on the Blue Blackout Spark XLR mic - nice. However, the microphones I'd like to focus on today are those popular options, specifically the Blue Snowball Ice and the Blue Yeti X. These represent the top and the bottom of the Blue spectrum when it comes to gaming-friendly USB mics. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Get 32GB of DDR5-6000 and a 2TB PCIe 4.0 SSD for £235 at CCL
    Did you know you can get a 32GB kit of 6000MT/s DDR5 RAM and a 2TB NVMe PCIe 4.0 SSD for £235 at CCL? That's an awesome deal on a normally £500 bundle that gives you some of the most critical components for a new high-spec Intel 12th-gen system. To get the deal, follow the link below to the TeamGroup Delta DDR5-6000 RAM. Add this to your cart, and you'll see that the TeamGroup Cardea Z44Q 2TB NVMe SSD is added for free as well. To reduce the price further, use code AFF15 at the checkout. Read more  ( 16 min )
    This Twitter bot tours Half-Life skyboxes to brighten up your timeline
    The second-best way to make Twitter palatable (after simply unfollowing sources of bad tweets) is to follow a load of curated and bot accounts which trickle niceness into your timeline. Today I'd like to suggest adding Skybox Satellite, a Twitter account which shows glimpses of the skies wrapped around maps in GoldSrc games like Half-Life and Counter-Strike. It's sometimes pretty, sometimes nostalgic, and sometimes impressive. Read more  ( 20 min )
    The Callisto Protocol is inspired by Die Hard and Shaun Of The Dead
    Back at Geoff Fest, I spoke with Glenn Schofield about The Callisto Protocol, its gore system, spiky walls, and batteries. From what I'd seen and heard, I was keen to see more of the sci-fi horror game that's not Dead Space but is also quite like Dead Space. So, at this year's Geoffscom I was able to see a 20-minute presentation of some new Callisto goodness and then chat with Striking Distance Studios' chief technology officer Mark James about what I'd seen. We touched on dismemberment, 3D printers, and Shaun Of The Dead, naturally. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Crusader Kings 3: Friends And Foes brings even more drama to the medieval soap opera next week
    If you thought things could get awkward and tense in Crusader Kings 3 then just wait for the arrival of its Friends And Foes pack on September 8th. There’s also the upcoming free Bastion update, which introduces memory maps for characters, the loyal and disloyal traits, and revamps childhood events. Have a watch of the trailer for Friends And Foes below, old buddy, old pal. Read more  ( 17 min )
    HyperX’s first gaming monitors are competent screens perched on modular mounts
    Last week HyperX announced their first-ever gaming monitors, the Armada 25 and Armada 27, and within a couple of days I was being led into their Gamescom booth to try each of them for myself. After a disappointingly uncomfortable preview of the Samsung Odyssey Ark, it was nice to get to grips with a far more utilitarian pair of monitors – albeit not without a party trick of their own, namely HyperX’s Armada Gaming Mount. Read more  ( 18 min )
    EWS podcast episode 200: the things we want 200 of in video games
    Standing on the shoulders of giants (Brendy and Pip and everyone else who did the podcast before us) means we have reached episode 200 of The Electronic Show podcast! Wowzer! Thanks for being with us for this record-breaking feat. We asked for suggestions and received many excellent ones, but in the end we went with a suggestion from Jonathon which, at the time we recorded, I did not realise would be instantly revealed by the episode title. Cheers to you all! Read more  ( 16 min )
    Microsoft's buyout of Activision Blizzard "could lead to competition concerns" say UK regulators
    Further investigation of Microsoft’s $68.7 billion takeover of Activision Blizzard is needed by the UK’s competition regulator, a statement on the government’s website confirmed today. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) began the preliminary stage of their investigation at the beginning of July, with a deadline set for September 1st. That initial stage of investigation found that the deal could “substantially lessen competition in gaming consoles, multi-game subscription services, and cloud gaming services”. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Rumoured Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla spin-off Mirage springs an art leak
    What looks like promotional material for an unreleased Assassin’s Creed game is being shared online today, starring someone in assassin garb for the first time in seven years. The images show what’s purported to be artwork of something called The Forty Thieves Quest for the rumoured Assassin’s Creed: Mirage, also known by the development name of Rift. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Project Code Name M, the mysterious new game from the Fata Morgana devs, shows a different side of Tokyo
    Stories always came first for the team at NOVECT. The critical and commercial success of The House In Fata Morgana surprised many upon the title’s international release, including the developers themselves. Headlines were made when the game shot temporarily to the spot of most critically-acclaimed game of all time on Metacritic, despite being still relatively under the radar beforehand. Fata Morgana first released to the public in Japan in 2012, and gained a cult following before its eventual successful international release. The reason for it's acclaim? Storytelling. Every single review praised Fata Morgana's surprising and enthralling twists and turns as what made this visual novel a must-play title, even for non-fans of the genre. At the time development started, NOVECT were less a development studio, and more of a group of univeristy friends with minimal coding experience but a love for telling stories; a hobby project run by friends on the side of university and normal jobs inside and out of the games industry, only becoming a fully-fledged studio later down the line. Fast forward to today, NOVECT are a firmly-established indie developer with games and multimedia adaptations of their work under their belt, and new project still mysteriously known as "Project Code Name 'M'" now in the works. Originally starting development in 2019 and announced earlier this year, Project M had its first public demo at this month’s Bitsummit indie gaming showcasing in Kyoto. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Bomb Rush Cyberfunk's release is sprayed over with a delay to summer 2023
    Futuristic cel-shaded skate ‘em up Bomb Rush Cyberfunk has seen its release window pushed back. The spiritual successor to classic Dreamcast skateathon Jet Set Radio had been scheduled to arrive sometime this year. You can now expect to play it in summer 2023. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Final Fantasy XIV’s new Island Sanctuary is more Tom Nook sim than peaceful paradise, but it works
    There were high expectations going into Buried Memory, patch 6.2 for Final Fantasy XIV - new raids, new story, and, most importantly, a new mode called Island Sanctuary to fulfil all of your farming dreams. There were Harvest Moon and Animal Crossing memes aplenty in the run up to release, with players hungry to customise their own cosy piece of Hydaelyn. Meant as a casual mode to relax away from dungeons and grinding levels, Island Sanctuary has no Job level limitations and can be enjoyed by anyone. Even though you can craft your own buildings and gather materials, you don’t need to have played any gathering or crafting classes. With a base to customise, crops to tend to and a pasture full of animals to pet, it’s easy to see why comparisons were drawn to other farming games such as Stardew Valley. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Ubisoft give online services for older games a stay of execution
    Today was due to be the day when some older Ubisoft games would see their online services decommissioned, but the company is granting them a temporary reprieve. You now have until October 1st to cram in some multiplayer for several early Assassin’s Creeds, the original version of Far Cry 3, Driver: San Francisco and others. Ubisoft say they’ve been “exploring what is possible to reduce disruption” over the last month, hence the shuffled date for decommissioning. Read more  ( 17 min )
    This 550W modular power supply is down to £40
    If the CPU is the brain of your computer and the GPU is the heart, then the power supply are the muscles, turning those thoughts and feelings into concrete action. Wait, that doesn't make any sense... In any case, power supplies are important, mm'kay, and this 550W 80+ Gold modular one from Corsair is discounted here in the UK. Normally you'd expect to pay £78 for this model - and at least £65 for one of this spec from a notable brand - but at Currys you can combine a price reduction with the code FNDDGAMING to get this PSU delivered for only £40. Read more  ( 16 min )
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    Ubuntu 20.04.5 LTS Released With Hardware Enablement Stack Backported From 22.04
    For those planning to stick to the Ubuntu 20.04 "Focal Fossa" Long-Term Support series still for some time before moving to the newer Ubuntu 22.04 LTS series, Ubuntu 20.04.5 LTS is available today as the newest point release in that older series...  ( 4 min )
    AMD Releases Orochi 1.0 For Dynamic Runtime Switching Between Radeon HIP & NVIDIA CUDA
    Earlier this year AMD's GPUOpen team announced the Orochi project for dynamic HIP/CUDA run-time handling. Orochi makes it easier for application developers to ship AMD HIP and NVIDIA CUDA support within a single code-base / binary that is then selected at run-time based on the GPU in use...  ( 4 min )
    Vulkan 1.3.226 Released With Mesh Shader Extension
    Vulkan 1.3.226 is out this morning and to much excitement adds the VK_EXT_mesh_shader extension as cross-vendor functionality for mesh shaders!..  ( 4 min )
    GCC vs. LLVM Clang Compilers For The Apple M2 On Linux
    With the Apple M2 running Asahi Linux you may be wondering whether it's better to use the GCC compiler as is the default on upstream Arch Linux or whether going for LLVM Clang will yield better performance given all the LLVM/Clang usage by AArch64 vendors, including Apple's own Xcode compiler toolchain making use of it. If you are wondering about GCC vs. Clang for building binaries on the Apple M2, here are some benchmarks.  ( 4 min )
    LibreOffice's Little-Used OpenCL Support Enjoys Some Code Cleaning
    Back in 2013 when AMD was pushing their Heterogeneous System Architecture (HSA) they joined The Document Foundation and wanted to make use of OpenCL acceleration within this open-source office suite. Shortly thereafter they added many OpenCL functions to LibreOffice but now a decade later it seems to be of little use but at least this week thanks to a Collabora engineer there has been some OpenCL code cleaning for this free software office suite...  ( 5 min )
    GCC Developers Discuss Possible -std=c++current & -std=c++future Options
    Inspired by Microsoft's compiler toolchain having a "std:c++latest" option for automatically targeting the latest supported C++ spec, GCC compiler developers have been discussing the possibility of a similar feature with the ability to specify -std=c++current for the current C++ standard or -std=c++future for the future/draft specification...  ( 5 min )
    Linux 6.1 Thunderbolt Networking To Support USB4 End-To-End Flow Control
    One of the interesting capabilities with Thunderbolt and now USB4 that is seemingly not too widely used is for networking between systems. The Linux kernel for the past half-decade already has offered a Thunderbolt networking driver for networking between hosts with Thunderbolt cables. The latest improvement on this front is now supporting USB4's end-to-end flow control mode...  ( 4 min )
    OBS Studio 28.0 Released With 10-Bit & HDR Video Encoding, Qt 6 Ported
    For the open-source software popular for screen-casting and videogame live-streaming, OBS Studio 28.0 was released today as a big feature update...  ( 4 min )
    Open-Source Arc Graphics, Apple M2, Mesa GPU Drivers & Linux 6.0 Excited Readers In August
    During the month of August on Phoronix there were 260 original news stories and Linux hardware reviews / benchmark articles written by your's truly. Here is a look back at what excited Linux / open-source readers the most this month...  ( 11 min )
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    Första riktiga glimten av Yakuza 8 kan komma nästa vecka
    Något Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio-relaterat blir det.  ( 6 min )
    Kvällsmys och kvällsrys åt en teknisk genomgång av The Last of Us Part I
    Digital Foundry kikar under huven.  ( 6 min )
    Detta kan vara första bilden från Assassin's Creed Mirage
    En konceptbild, men ändå!  ( 6 min )
    FZ Play - Gerda: A Flame in Winter
    Att vara ockuperad av nazisterna från ett danskt perspektiv.  ( 6 min )
    Brittisk konkurrensmyndighet menar att Microsofts Activision-affär kan "försvaga Playstation"
    På ett betydande vis.  ( 7 min )
    Diablo, CoD och Overwatch kommer till Game Pass, om Activision Blizzard-köpet blir av
    Phil Spencer snackar framtidsplaner.  ( 7 min )
    Biomutant till Nintendo Switch i oktober?
    Tecken finns.  ( 6 min )
    Nya Zelda-rykten: Wind Waker och Twilight Princess till Switch presenteras inom kort
    Kan komma inom två veckor, tror spekulatörer.  ( 6 min )
    Quiz – Vad kan du om remakes?
    Om vi haft remake-quiz tidigare...? Jo, men det här är en total remake av det quizzet.  ( 6 min )
    Arkane tvingades att döpa Prey till Prey av Bethesda
    Och gillade det verkligen inte.  ( 7 min )
    Systemkraven för Hogwarts Legacy ser rätt snälla ut
    Men förlitar sig på uppskalningsteknik.  ( 6 min )
    Ubisoft ger pc-spelare en chans att behålla DLC till äldre spel
    Och skjuter upp nedstängningen av spelens online-tjänster.  ( 6 min )
    Septembers Playstation Plus-spel har avslöjats
    Vad sägs om racing, fotografiska äventyr och slagsmål?  ( 6 min )
    Sons of the Forest försenas till nästa år
    Men utvecklaren lovar att det är den sista förseningen.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Testpilot: Philips Momentum 27M1F5500P – för den som gillar ljusstark bild
    Nissling gör entré som testpilot och testar en ny Philips-spelskärm med allroundegenskaper.  ( 12 min )
    Lenovo Glasses T1 är bildskärm i glasögonformat
    Med skärmarna inbyggda i bågarna ska både underhållning och arbete tas till nästa nivå, samtidigt som nyfikna blickar över axeln undviks.  ( 6 min )
    Quiz: Svensk tech-historia
    Svenska IT- och teknikbolag finns det gott om. Hur bra koll har du på svensk tech-historia?  ( 5 min )
    USA begränsar Nvidias export av kretsar till Kina
    Krav på licenser för export av AI-fokuserade grafikkretsar sätter käppar i hjulen för grafikjättarna och riskerar försena grafikarkitekturen "Hopper" för datacenter.  ( 6 min )
    LG Ultragear belönar League of Legends-fantaster med biljetter
    Högoktanigt spelande äger rum i Malmö den 10 och 11 september. Nu korar LG Ultragear 8 vinnare som får biljetter till League of Legends European Championship Finals.  ( 7 min )
    Samsung utökar Odyssey-familjen med ultrabred OLED
    Samsungs panelteknik QD-OLED tar plats i det egna sortimentet, där 34 tum i välvt utförande och 175 Hz kombineras med TV-funktionen Gaming Hub.  ( 6 min )
    Sony avtäcker Xperia 5 IV – kompakt telefon med videofokus
    Sony bygger ut med ännu en avlång modell, som erbjuder 4K-inspelning i 120 FPS och autofokus med ögonspårning för samtliga av baksidans kameror.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Crusader Kings III: Friends & Foes releases next week, other DLC prices going up
    Paradox Interactive has announced the Crusader Kings III: Friends & Foes event pack releases September 8 and they also mentioned some price rises.  ( 4 min )
    Get the Dungeons trilogy in this new bundle ahead of Dungeons 4
    Recently developer Realmforge Studios and publisher Kalypso Media announced Dungeons 4, and so they put all the previous games into a Humble Bundle for you.  ( 4 min )
    Core Keeper has a new roadmap with a mini-update due soon
    Core Keeper, the delightful pixel-art mining sandbox adventure that you can play solo or online with friends has a new roadmap. It sounds pretty exciting too with a mini-update coming out soon.  ( 4 min )
    Cross-vendor Mesh Shading for the Vulkan API is now here
    Today the Vulkan API specification 1.3.226 was released and it brings with it an exciting new extension with VK_EXT_mesh_shader.  ( 4 min )
    Heroic Games Launcher gets an emergency hotfix for Epic Games Store logins
    Recently it seems something changed over on the Epic Games Store and so third-party programs trying to login like the Heroic Games Launcher would fail. Thankfully a fix was found.  ( 5 min )
    Controller support for V Rising planned, better Steam Deck support
    Stunlock Studios have revealed quite a lot of their plans for V Rising, the popular open-world vampire survival game.  ( 4 min )
    These were the most popular Steam Deck games in August 2022
    Valve has revealed what the most popular games were on Steam Deck for August 2022, so here's the list.  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Emmanuel Kasper: OpenShift vs. AWS product mapping
    If you know the Amazon Web Services portfolio, and you are interested in OpenShift or the OKD OpenShift community distribution, this is a table of corresponding technologies. OpenShift is Red Hat’s Kubernetes distribution: it is basically the upstream Kubernetes delivered with monitoring, logging, CI/CD, underlying OS, tested upgrade paths not found with a manual kubernetes.io kubeadm install. AWS OpenShift OpenShift upstream project Cloud Trail Kubernetes API Server audit log Kubernetes Cloud Watch OpenShift Monitoring Prometheus AWS Artifact Compliance Operator OpenSCAP AWS Trusted Advisor Insights AWS Marketplace OpenShift Operator Hub AWS Identity and Access Management (IAM) Red Hat SSO Keycloack AWS Elastisc Beanstalk OpenShift Source2Image (S2I) Source2Image (S2I) AWS S3 ODF Rados Gateway Rook RGW AWS Elastic Bloc Storage ODF Rados Block Device Rook RBD AWS Elastic File System ODF Ceph FS Rook CephFS Amazon Simple Notification Service OpenShift Streams for Apache Kafka Apache Kafka Amazon Guard Duty API Server audit log review, ACS Runtime detection Stackrox Amazon Inspector Quay.io container scanner, ACS Vulnerability Assessment Clair, Stackrox AWS Lambda Openshift Serverless* Knative AWS Key Management System could be done with Hashicorp Vault Vault AWS WAF NGINX Ingress Controller Operator with ModSecurity NGINX ModSecurity Amazon Elasticache Redis Enterprise Operator Redis, memcached as alternative AWS Relational Database Service Crunchy Data Operator PostgreSQL * OpenShift Serverless requires the application to be packaged as a container, something AWS Lamda does not require.  ( 5 min )
    Shirish Agarwal: Culture, Books, Friends
    Culture Just before I start, I would like to point out that this post may or would probably be NSFW. Again, what is SFW (Safe at Work) and NSFW that so much depends on culture and perception of culture from wherever we are or wherever we take birth? But still, to be on the safe side I have put it as NSFW. Now there have been a few statements and ideas that gave me a pause. This will be a sort of chaotic blog post as I am in such a phase today. For e.g. while I do not know which culture or which country this comes from, somebody shared that in some cultures one can talk/comment ‘May your poop be easy’ and with a straight face. I dunno which culture is this but if somebody asked me that I would just die from laughing or maybe poop there itself. While I can understand if it is a constipated …  ( 20 min )
    Russ Allbery: Summer haul
    Squire (graphic novel) Legends & Lattes (sff) Six of Crows (sff) Artifact Space (sff) The Power Broker (nonfiction) Servant Mage (sff) Spear (sff) A Mirror Mended (sff) Postwar (nonfiction) Nettle & Bone (sff) Why Buildings Fall Down (nonfiction) The Fed Unbound (nonfiction) Trade Me (romance) Allow Me to Retort (nonfiction) Miss Percy's Pocket Guide (sff) The Nordic Theory of Everything (nonfiction) Hogfather (sff) Jingo (sff) The Last Continent (sff) Carpe Jugulum (sff) The Fifth Elephant (sff) The Truth (sff) On Critical Race Theory (nonfiction) A Spaceship Repair Girl Supposedly Named Rachel (sff) Black Stars (sff anthology) The Kaiju Preservation Society (sff) Seeing Like a State (nonfiction) Trang (sff) Trust (sff) And Shall Machines Surrender (sff) Free (nonfiction)  ( 1 min )
    Paul Wise: FLOSS Activities August 2022
    Focus This month I didn't have any particular focus. I just worked on issues in my info bubble. Changes webdl: support ffmpeg 5 libpst: better error purple-discord: fix line ending, mojibake pass-audit: typos duck: add more match output, obsolete site, indicator phrase, fix comparisons, whitespace, sentence lintian: add obsolete site reportbug: minor cleanup, add ftp.d.o usertags Debian usertags: fix repro builds, ports, ftp-master usertags Debian package uploads: sptag, purple-discord, circuitbreaker Debian wiki pages: DebConf/25, DebianDay/2022/Brazil (FranciscoBeltr%C3%A3o, MinasGerais), DebianExperimental, DebianHosting, DebianServiceForDD, Firmware/Open, InstallingDebianOn/Microsoft/SurfaceBook, Locale, LocalGroups/DebianQuebec, Martinwguy, NetworkManager/iwd, PortsDocs/New, PrivacyIs…  ( 1 min )
  • Open

    Micro: Making File Editing Easier in Linux Terminal
    Editing with Micro is much easier than with other editors like Vim and Emacs. You can even use your regular Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V, Ctrl+Z shortcuts in Micro.  ( 24 min )

  • Open

    The RX 6950 XT continues to drop in price - now £800
    The RX 6950 XT is AMD's flagship card, a 4K gaming powerhouse that can put almost any game to shame - as long as you don't turn on ray tracing, anyway. The card launched at £1100 but often sold for far more, but now we're starting to see things slide the other way - and the top AMD GPU now costs only £800 at Overclockers in the UK. That's £300 below RRP and a new low-water mark. Read more  ( 16 min )
    System Shock is shaping up to be a faithful remake of the sci-fi classic
    Nightdive's remake of 1994 classic System Shock hasn't had the smoothest development run, first having some money issues in its Kickstarter a while back, then having to reboot itself with twenty-twenty-something release dates chucked out there more as hopeful concepts than assurances. Having gone hands-on with a short 20-minute-ish demo of the game at this year's Gamescom, I can confirm that the remake is real and seems faithful to the original despite some heavy tinkers in the modernisation station. For nostalgic fans it should make for an exciting revisit to cyberspace, but I'm unsure whether it'll land quite as well for newcomers seeking a showdown with Shodan. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Saturnalia's neon-folk survival horror will stick to you for a very long time
    We've got a pretty good line in interesting folk traditions here at RPS. I grew up in a county where staying up all night at the stone circle to welcome the Summer Solstice was an annual tradition (later augmented by a woman wearing antlers offering a selection of downers and hallucinogens), and as a child I had an unnecessary encounter with the Salisbury Hob-Nob. For the past few years Alice0 has gone to the Burryman's Parade, gracing us with pictures of that most wholesome gentleman. Rural traditions are fun if you're part of them, but to outsiders they can be unsettling at best. This is relevant to my thinking about Saturnalia, an upcoming survival horror game by Italian studio Santa Ragione, where a small group of outsiders try to escape a village on the night of an ancient ritual. I've been playing a preview build of Saturnalia for the last week or so, and also got to talk about it with the studio director Pietro Righi Riva. "I usually tell people, 'Oh, you should make a game in like six months', and I have tried to do that in the past," he tells me. "This one just kind of got out of hand. I found an email yesterday, as I was looking for finishing the credits, about me discussing some story items in April 2017." And, while I am sure that most developers don't wish they'd been making a video game in the middle of the pandemic, I think the extra time may have allowed Santa Ragione to make something excellent. Read more  ( 21 min )
    Sony and Tencent buy almost a third of FromSoftware’s stock in joint deal
    Sony Interactive Entertainment and Chinese conglomerate Tencent have bought a combined 30% of stock in Elden Ring and Souls series developers FromSoftware, parent company Kadokawa Corporation have announced today. The transaction leaves Sony with a 14% stake in FromSoft, and Tencent acquiring 16% of the company’s shares. Kadokawa remain the largest shareholders, holding almost a 70% stake in FromSoft. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Stranded: Alien Dawn is a familiar survival sim with room to grow
    Stranded: Alien Dawn is Haemimont Games’ second sci-fi sim on the trot, and despite being set on a planet that actually has air this time, it could well make Surviving Mars’ well-funded colony building feel like an afternoon playing with Lego. In Stranded, as I saw from a hands-off preview at Gamescom 2022, you’re certainly not planetside by choice, having crash-landed on an uncharted world with just four surviving astronauts left to scavenge, hunt and build their way towards something resembling a life. “Like RimWorld”, I thought to myself upon hearing the pre-demo pitch, and subsequently wrote in my notes four separate times before ceasing to bother. If only mere words could convey just how much “like RimWorld” Stranded: Alien Dawn is – other 3D-ified clones exist, like last year’s Going Medieval, but here, even the exact spaceship-wrecking premise matches that of Ludeon Studios' seminal survival sim. Read more  ( 19 min )
    RPS will be at PAX West 2022
    Team RPS are off once again and this time we'll be stomping all over PAX West! Katharine and Liam had a great time poking around PAX East back in April and we’re now making our way over to the west coast to make more exclusive videos for RPS premium supporters. This time, Liam will be joined by myself (hello!) as we cover the show floor from top to bottom, from when the doors open on Friday, September 2nd until they boot everyone out the evening of Monday, September 25th. We’ll be interviewing developers, attending panels, and sharing our thoughts on the best upcoming games on the show floor. If you fancy joining us on our tour through PAX, you can sign up to the RPS supporter program today for just £6 / $8 monthly. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Zachtronics are collecting all their solitaire games together in September
    Former indie puzzle specialists Zachtronics are releasing another game despite having closed their doors earlier this year. It’s a collection of their many minigame interpretations of the classic single-player card game, solitaire. The Zachtronics Solitaire Collection releases on Steam on September 6th, and adds a new version themed around tarot decks. Each version of the card game has been updated with 4K graphics. Have a sneaky peek at the trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    High On Life's talking alien guns aren't as annoying as you might think
    I went into my High On Life hands-on session with one expectation: its talking alien guns will annoy the heck out of me. But in a surprising turn of events, I left thinking the game was a real highlight of my time in Cologne's multi-hall maze of excellent people and overpriced schnitzel. And most importantly, the guns didn't annoy me at all! In fact, their craic contributed a great deal to my enjoyment of the strangest FPS I've played in a while - one where I was forever grinning at the screen like an idiot. If you're a fan of Rick And Morty from before it got weird to be a fan of Rick And Morty (or Squanch Games' back catalogue, or general bizarro laughs), this is one for the wishlist. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Netflix’s Cyberpunk 2077 anime show Edgerunners streams into your brain from September 13th
    The anime series based on CD Projekt Red’s Cyberpunk 2077 starts streaming on Netflix on September 13th, a new trailer has revealed. Jack in, boot up and sit down to watch the not-safe-for-work trailer for Cyberpunk: Edgerunners below. Just tell your boss they’re needed in a meeting or something. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Shovel Knight Dig is a procedurally generated platformer rocking up on Steam in September
    Platforming hero Shovel Knight dons their horned helmet again on September 23rd when the series next instalment, Shovel Knight Dig, arrives on Steam. This time, ol’ Shoves and pal Shield Knight are tangling with the nefarious Drill Knight, who’s pinched all the stuff from their campsite, believe it or not. Devs Yacht Club Games enlisted YouTubers Arin Hanson and Jirard ‘The Completionist’ Khalil to announce the game, and you can watch the trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    NetEase have acquired Quantic Dream
    Chinese tech giants NetEase have announced they’ve fully acquired Detroit: Become Human and Heavy Rain developers Quantic Dream, following a smaller investment in the company in 2019. Quantic Dream’s co-CEOs David Cage and Guillaime de Fondaumière will remain in place, and the studio will continue to function independently from NetEase. The cost of the deal hasn’t been disclosed. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Rocksmith+'s guitar-teaching subscription service will finally launch next week
    Rocksmith+ was announced and intended for release last year, only to be delayed after beta feedback. It has now resurfaced, and the new subscription service for Ubisoft's guitar-teaching series will instead launch next week on September 6th. Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    FCC has approved $6 billion in broadband grants despite rejecting Starlink
    Fixed wireless and fiber ISPs get money as FCC continues cleanup of Pai program.  ( 7 min )
    AI wins state fair art contest, annoys humans
    Stealth win for AI-generated art inspires heated ethics debate on social media.  ( 5 min )
    Today’s best deals: Apple AirPods Max, Peacock subscriptions, and more
    Dealmaster also has gaming monitors, the MacBook Pro, and Google's Chromecast.  ( 8 min )
    Chrome extensions with 1.4M installs covertly track visits and inject code
    If you've installed any of these extensions, manually remove them stat.  ( 4 min )
    Microsoft EU cloud revisions just so happen to exclude Google, Amazon
    Move to appease EU partners bars running MS apps on competitors' infrastructure.  ( 5 min )
    The 2023 Genesis GV60 is a strong contender for EV of the year
    Some of the tech feels a bit gimmicky, but there's a lot to like about this one.  ( 6 min )
    FDA authorizes BA.4/5-targeting COVID boosters from Moderna and Pfizer
    The new boosters are expected to start going into arms around Labor Day.  ( 6 min )
    Google gives developers a way to sidestep Android 13’s one-way update
    Google posts an anti-rollback workaround, but only for developers.  ( 5 min )
    Crypto firm accidentally gave $10.5M to sisters, now wants their $1.35M house
    Australian judge decided whether court docs could be served by OneDrive link.  ( 5 min )
    Dell confirms some XPS 13 Plus laptop screens may detach inadvertently
    Dell says it's reaching out to affected customers, retailers to replace the PCs.  ( 5 min )
    Indie dev mounts successful sting operation against scammy Steam curators
    "Reviewers" seemed focused on getting free game keys for resale, not playing.  ( 5 min )
    No gimmicks, no problems: The low-fuss, reasonably priced e-bike
    The Velotric Discovery 1 isn't about looks or performance, but it's a fine e-bike.  ( 6 min )
    Japan declares war on floppy disks for government use
    In Japan, 1,900 government procedures still require submission on floppy disk.  ( 5 min )
    The Last Of Us Pt 1 remake review: Enough upgrades to leave us stunned
    PS5 refresh redeems combat, reignites drama—but is still chained to 2013 source.  ( 6 min )
    Apple quietly revamps malware scanning features in newer macOS versions
    New version of XProtect is "as active as many commercial anti-malware products."  ( 6 min )
    Real money, fake musicians: A million-dollar Instagram verification scheme
    A jeweler, a plastic surgeon, an OnlyFans Model got the coveted blue check.  ( 7 min )
    A faulty sensor may have scrubbed the launch of NASA’s massive SLS rocket
    "The way the sensor is behaving does not line up with the physics of the situation."  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Arm sues Qualcomm over custom Nuvia CPU cores, wants designs destroyed
    British chip designer unhappy with how one of its key customers is using lucrative blueprints Arm is suing Qualcomm, one of its key customers, in a row over the latter's Nuvia custom CPU cores.…  ( 5 min )
    Cloudflare tries to explain why it protects far-right forums that stalk and harass victims
    Doxing and hate-spreading websites deserve as much space on the internet as you or I, says CEO On Wednesday content delivery network Cloudflare published a blog post explaining the circumstances under which abusive websites are eligible for service, just as a storm is brewing on that very topic.…  ( 6 min )
    Toyota commits $2.5b to North Carolina battery factory
    Additional Japanese battery plant investments will add 40GWh of production capacity by 2026 Toyota says it plans to invest up to an additional $5.6 billion in electric vehicle (EV) battery production that it will split between facilities in the US and Japan. …  ( 4 min )
    Woman forced to sell 4-bed house after crypto exchange wrongly refunded $7.2m
    Payment from Crypto.com was off by five zeroes because bank account number was mistakenly entered An Australian woman has been sued after she received part of an erroneous refund from a cryptocurrency exchange – erroneous by five zeroes – that it failed to notice for seven months.…  ( 4 min )
    Snap to lay off one in five employees as losses mount
    Original shows, games, the company's other apps, and more also being axed Snap CEO Evan Spiegel has confirmed layoffs at the struggling social media biz, telling employees in a letter that 20 percent of them will lose their jobs, mostly from teams working on one of the variety of projects it also plans to ax.…  ( 5 min )
    Former Microsoft UX boss doesn't like the Windows 11 Start menu either
    Issues ranging from design to banner ads are justified criticisms of a button coming under heavy fire The one-time director of user experience at Microsoft has added his voice to the ongoing chorus of Windows 11 users who are criticizing the design and usability of the latest operating system's Start menu.…  ( 6 min )
    TSMC poised to begin 3nm production despite weaker chip demand
    Meanwhile ongoing supply chain difficulties reportedly hampering fab-building efforts Taiwanese chip giant TSMC is to begin volume production of 3nm silicon within weeks, amid warnings that demand for semiconductors is weakening with Korean companies reporting the first drop in shipments for three years.…  ( 4 min )
    MX Linux 21.2: Middleweight Debian-based distro is well worth a look
    We took our first official test drive and became a little infatuated There are so many Debian derivatives out there that a few months ago, we did a roundup that compared some of the leading ones. We mentioned antiX and MX Linux, saying that we planned to come back and give MX a fuller review. The project just put out its second point-release of 2022, which seemed like a good time to do so.…  ( 11 min )
    India wants to quadruple electronics biz in just four years
    Minister says it needs to copy Vietnam and China's 'first globalize, then localize' strategy India's Ministry of State for Electronics & Information Technology released a report this week exploring how the subcontinent might increase electronics production by roughly 400 percent and exports by an ambitious 750 percent by 2026.…  ( 5 min )
    Voyager 1 data corrupted by onboard computer that 'stopped working years ago'
    Deeply impressive that NASA engineers fixed telemetry transmit glitch on 1970s probe in the first place NASA knows the "how" but not the why of a telemetry data routing snafu that caused "garbled" information about the 45-year-old Voyager 1 probe's position to be sent to mission controllers on the ground.…  ( 5 min )
    SAP picks Airbus finance chief Dominik Asam for next CFO
    Set to take the controls next year as software giant executes tricky maneuver in the cloud SAP has appointed Airbus's Dominik Asam as the CFO who will replace long-serving finance boss Luka Mucic at the German software giant.…  ( 4 min )
    Big cloud rivals hit back over Microsoft licensing changes
    Customers should be able to 'move freely' says Google cloud veep as AWS brands move 'unfair' Microsoft's cloud competitors have reacted negatively to changes the company announced this week to licensing, claiming that they are anti-competitive and will deter customers from moving to other cloud providers.…  ( 5 min )
    HP's consumer PC biz shrinks by a fifth as inflation bites
    The solution? Inventing another 'transformation programme' to transform previous transformation HP is putting together a recovery plan to counter a sharp slowdown in its PC and printer businesses, including yet another transformation program.…  ( 5 min )
    Decisions on health data sharing should not be taken by politicians, citizen juries find
    Britain's National Data Guardian report also warns NHS needs to earn people’s trust, support for controversial data platform As the NHS in England is set to launch a competition for a far-reaching patient data platform, a public consultation has said decisions about health data sharing should not be taken by politicians.…  ( 6 min )
    Astera Labs says its CXL tech sticks DDR5 into a PCIe slot
    These memory controllers are aimed at AI-addicted cloud providers and hyperscalers Astera Labs wants to make it simpler and cheaper for cloud and hyperscale customers to keep up with ever larger AI models, by allowing DRAM to be attached directly to a PCIe slot using its Compute Express Link (CXL) memory controllers.…  ( 5 min )
    Left-wing campaign group throws weight behind BT strikes
    Enough is Enough crew tells telecom CEO to 'pay up' Left-wing firebrands behind the Enough is Enough campaign in the UK are throwing their weight behind the thousands of BT Group engineers and call center staff on the picket lines today in protest over pay.…  ( 4 min )
    What are Nvidia and AMD doing getting involved with SmartNICs and VMware?
    A gentle primer on these chip giants' accelerators – and your essential guide to the conference so far VMware Explore  SmartNICs have long been the domain of hyperscale and cloud datacenters, but they remain relatively uncommon in enterprise environments due in large part to the lack of software compatibility. But with official support for AMD and Nvidia's data processing units (DPUs) now baked into VMware's popular hypervisor, that may not be the case for much longer.…  ( 6 min )
    Startup wants to build a space station that refuels satellites by 2025
    Orbit Fab hopes to charge $20m for a hydrazine refill – and you thought fuel prices down here were bad! Spacecraft running low on fuel could get a refill from an orbital station by the year 2025, according to a startup named Orbit Fab that reckons it can charge $20 million to top up your tank.…  ( 4 min )
    China-linked APT40 gang targets wind farms, Australian government
    ScanBox installed after victims lured to fake Murdoch news sites with phishing emails Researchers at security company Proofpoint and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC) said on Tuesday they had identified a cyber espionage campaign that delivers the ScanBox exploitation framework through a malicious fake Australian news site.…  ( 4 min )
    California to try tackling drought with canal-top solar panels
    Watt an interesting idea California is ready to try out something that could help it save water and generate electricity at the same time: solar panels over irrigation canals.…  ( 5 min )
    Japan to change laws that require use of floppy disks
    Digital minister will drive change because, in theory, uploading info to government isn’t allowed Japan’s digital minister Karo Tono has pledged to rip up laws that require floppy disks and CD-ROMs to be used when sending data to the nation’s government.…  ( 5 min )
    Musk tries to stall Twitter takeover trial following whistleblower claims
    And throws a copy of Mudge's allegations to the SEC, too, just in case it hasn't read them yet Elon Musk's lawyers issued a double whammy this week in the ongoing quest by the world's richest man to cancel his own proposed takeover of Twitter.…  ( 5 min )
    California lawmakers approve online privacy law for kids. Which may turn websites into identity checkpoints
    Will Newsom sign it? With a possible presidential bid looming, take a guess California lawmakers have approved a major online safety bill to protect children – and critics worry the legislation will turn websites into identity checkpoints.…  ( 6 min )
    Find a security hole in Google's open source and you could bag a $31,337 reward
    Will it be enough to prevent the next software supply-chain attack? Google has created a bug bounty program that will reward those who find and report vulnerabilities in its open-source projects, thereby hopefully strengthening software supply-chain security.…  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Crypto Exchange Founder Fled With $2 Billion Busted, Faces 40,000 Years in Jail
    Turkish crypto exchange founder who absconded with $2 billion last year caught, now faces 40,000 years of jail time.  ( 59 min )
    Arm Sues Qualcomm and Nuvia for Breaking License Agreement
    Arm accuses Qualcomm and Nuvia of illegally developing Arm processors following Nuvia takeover.  ( 59 min )
    AVX-512 Makes Ryzen 9 7950X Geekbench 5 Results Look Good — Too Good
    A new Geekbench 5 benchmark shows very impressive scores for the Ryzen 9 7950X, especially as compared to its predecessor — but there's more to the story.  ( 60 min )
    Asus Will Offer Freebies with AMD X670E Motherboards in UK Promo
    Asus to bundle headsets, mice, webcams with advanced AM5 motherboards.  ( 59 min )
    Samsung's First OLED Gaming Monitor Will Launch in Q4 2022
    Samsung's new Odyssey OLED G8 gaming monitor is packed with smart TV features that let you use it without a PC.  ( 59 min )
    Japanese Government Will Finally Stop Using Floppy Disks and CD-ROMs
    Japanese Minister of Digital Affairs says it's time to move on from 40-year-old storage technology.  ( 59 min )
    Imagination Tech Discusses Its Return to the High-Performance PC GPU Market
    The UK graphics IP firm outlines some of the tech specs of the Fantasy 1 and Fantasy 2 graphics cards being introduced by China’s Innosilicon.  ( 60 min )
    AMD’s Ryzen 7 5800X3D Down To $384: Real Deals
    Ahead of the launch of AMD's Zen 4 CPU lineup, the AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D has been reduced to $384.  ( 66 min )
    Raspberry Pi Radio Controller Doubles as Handheld Gaming Rig
    Maker and developer Leon, aka Leoneq at Reddit, is using a Raspberry Pi to power a handheld radio controller that runs RetroPie (or any other OS).  ( 62 min )
    Seven Asus B650 and B650E Motherboards Leak With PCIe 5.0 Support
    Seven new Asus B650 and B650E motherboards have been revealed, ahead of release later this year.  ( 59 min )
    LG LX3 Claimed to Be the World’s First Bendable 4K OLED TV
    The LX3 can change from flat to 900R with a click of its remote. This 4K OLED TV can run at up to 120 Hz, and has a wide selection of gaming-friendly features like support for variable refresh rates and Game Mode presets.  ( 60 min )
    Asus Zenbook 17 Fold OLED Review: Increase the Crease
    The Asus Zenbook 17 Fold OLED is the biggest foldable PC, but the company has done little to advance the design of folding computers. It has a beautiful display but is still chunky and expensive.  ( 76 min )
  • Open

    Zelda: Twilight Princess and Wind Waker Switch ports reportedly set for reveal in September
    Nintendo is poised to reveal Switch ports of Wii U's The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess HD and The Wind Waker HD according to a new report, with the announcement said to arrive as part of a new Nintendo Direct in September. That's according to GamesBeat managing editor Mike Minotti and the ever-leaky Jeff Grubb who, speaking during Grubb's latest Game Mess podcast (thanks VGC), claimed to be "very, very sure" the dual Zelda port announcements were on the way. "100% there is a Nintendo Direct in September," said Grubb. "I think there's going to be a lot of Zelda stuff at this thing, I think this is going to be a Zelda blowout for Nintendo." Read more  ( 15 min )
    Ubisoft postpones "decommissioning" of older online titles until October
    Following July's announcement that Ubisoft would be "decommissioning" the online portions of some of its older titles on 1st September, the publisher has said it's postponing the move to 1st October in many cases, and that Anno 2070 will now escape unscathed. Ubisoft originally announced that 15 titles that would be affected by the move: Anno 2070, Assassin's Creed 2, Assassin's Creed 3, Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, Assassin's Creed Liberation HD, Assassin's Creed Revelations, Driver San Francisco, Far Cry 3, Ghost Recon Future Soldier, Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands, Rayman Legends, Silent Hunter 5, Space Junkies, Splinter Cell: Blacklist, and ZombiU. The precise effects of decommissioning depend on the game, but ranged from the removal of multiplayer modes, online features, and DLC to being unable to access the game at all. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Sam & Max: Save the World, Beyond Time and Space remasters heading to PlayStation
    Sam & Max: Save the World and its follow-up season Beyond Time and Space will be making their way to Playstation in remastered form on 29th September. Sam & Max: Save the World and Sam & Max: Beyond Time and Space were, if you're unfamiliar, some of the earliest titles from The Walking Dead studio Telltale Games (releasing in 2006 and 2007 respectively), each serving up a six-episode arc of point-and-click mayhem starring Steve Purcell's anarchic comic book crime-fighting dog and bunny duo. While never quite living up to the lofty heights of LucasArts' 1993 classic Sam & Max: Hit the Road, both games bought their own wonderfully chaotic charms - Save the World's story starting with former child stars running amok before taking increasingly bizarre turns, and Beyond Time and Space going even weirder with everything from vampires to Santa Claus. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Arkane really didn't want to call Prey (2017) 'Prey'
    Raphaël Colantonio has revealed that nobody at Arkane Austin wanted Prey (2017) to be titled Prey, and how it felt "gross" to have release something under someone else's IP. Colantonio, known as the founder of Arkane Studios, served as the game's director and writer. He announced his departure from the studio shortly after the game's release, citing burnout and a desire to spend time with his son. The fact that the game was never envisioned to be a part of the Prey IP isn't new for fans of the game or Arkane. It was documented by NoClip last year, in which Colantonio and other leads on the game explained that Bethesda was insistent that Arkane's next project had to be called Prey. Colantonio described the decision as a "non-negotiable compromise". Read more  ( 17 min )
    PlayStation Plus additions for September include Deathloop, Assassin's Creed, Sly Cooper and more
    Sony has revealed all the games hitting PlayStation Plus in September. As leaked earlier today, Need for Speed Heat, Toem, and Granblue Fantasy Versus will all be available as free monthly games for PS Plus Essential subscribers. However, there's even more coming to the PS Plus Catalogue for Extra and Premium subscribers. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Square Enix looks set to dominate Tokyo Game Show 2022
    Square Enix will showcase a number of games at Tokyo Game Show 2022, including Crisis Core Final Fantasy 7 Reunion, Forspoken, Harvestella and more. The full list of exhibitors for the show has been released, as well as the games being shown. Sadly, that does mean it seems Final Fantasy 16 is not set to be shown. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The Last of Us Part 1 developers on the journey to PlayStation 5 and the endless promise of accessibility
    Nine years ago, The Last of Us was first released for the PlayStation 3. Here, we met Joel, Ellie and a whole cast of characters making their way in a world riddled with danger and aggression. The game tells a sad story, but also a multi-faceted one. Back in 2013, The Last of Us left its players with a message that hope, humour and unconditional love could still exist, even in a world divided by fear. Now, the game is being released once more, remade from the ground up for the PlayStation 5. Ahead of this release, I sat down with developers Matthew Gallant and Shaun Escayg to talk about the new accessibility features coming to The Last of Us Part 1, and the business of making what they openly describe as "a love letter" to the game's fans. Please note, there will be spoilers for The Last of Us Part 1 in what follows. Read more  ( 22 min )
    The Last of Us Part 1 - as complete a remake as you could hope for
    When Naughty Dog revealed The Last of Us Part 1 earlier this year, a complete visual remake of the original The Last of Us from 2013, we were a little surprised. There's always a debate to be had about the timing of a re-release, and we wondered whether the new version would be different enough from the 2014 PS4 remaster and 2016 PS4 Pro patch to justify a purchase from newcomers to the seasons and series veterans alike. After spending some time with the final release, we have some answers - including comparisons between the new PS5 release and the prior PS3 and PS4 versions, the video modes available and the gameplay changes included. First, let's rewind. The Last of Us was the PS3's swan song, a showpiece title released just months before the arrival of the PS4. The mix of storytelling, survival horror and action resonated with fans, becoming one of Naughty Dog's most successful games ever. The technical challenge Naughty Dog created for itself was the creation of a world almost entirely devoid of electric lights - The Last of Us relies heavily on indirect lighting which, in 2013, was still very difficult to achieve even when leaning on pre-calculated techniques. Against the odds, Naughty Dog did manage to come up with a suitable solution to this problem - it's far from perfect, mind you, but the world was convincingly lit and designed. The problem was that on PS3, the performance just didn't hold up and many larger areas exhibited severe frame-rate issues that detracted from the experience. This is where PS4 enters the picture. One year later, Naughty Dog released a Remastered version of the game for the new console offering higher resolutions and a smooth frame-rate - effectively overcoming the issues inherent in the original release. Naughty Dog returned to The Last of Us once again with that PS4 Pro update, allowing for up to native 4K rendering at 30fps. That PS4 Pro code also runs great on PS5, so what more could a native PS5 version offer? Read more  ( 23 min )
    Konami teasing new game from "world-loved series" at Tokyo Games Show 2022
    Konami has released its lineup for Tokyo Game Show 2022, including a new unannounced game. The presentation for this game will last 45 minutes and will feature voice actor Yuki Kaji "as a guest to represent fans of a world-loved series title", reports Gematsu. It's unclear beyond this description what the game could be. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Aloy receives Pride face paint in new Horizon Forbidden West update
    A new update for Horizon Forbidden West adds a Mark of Pride face paint. The face paint is also accessible in Photo Mode and adds LGBT+ colours. It's welcome support for the community, even outside of Pride Month. Elsewhere, Patch 1.18 provides a number of tweaks and bug fixes. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Immortality will be available on mobile via Netflix "very soon"
    Immortality, the latest game from Sam Barlow, is on its way to Netflix via Apple and Android devices "very soon". The game was released yesterday across Xbox Series X/S and PC (via Steam and GOG). It's also on Game Pass. Netflix subscribers will also be able to play the game on their mobile devices, once released. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Scammers posing as Steam curators snuffed out by indie dev
    A number of Steam curator groups have been removed from the platform after a developer managed to figure out they were in fact scammers. BROK the InvestiGator, developed by solo indie dev Cowcat Games, released on 26th August on Steam and GOG. On Steam, Cowcat noted that BROK had received mostly positive reviews from players, gaming sites and curators alike. Two days later, Cowcat posted a Twitter thread regarding some unusual behaviour from curators. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Activision battles to contain Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 campaign gameplay leak
    Activision is currently battling to contain a Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 gameplay leak that popped up online last night. The campaign gameplay appears to have originated from Twitter account @3rbbcod. It shows new vehicle mechanics, including hijacking, leaping from vehicle to vehicle and vehicle destruction. These new mechanics, already discussed by principal Modern Warfare 2 developer Infinity Ward, are also coming to battle royale Warzone 2. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Terraria first Steam game to hit a million reviews and maintain Overwhelmingly Positive status
    Terraria is the first game on Steam to cross a million reviews and maintain an Overwhelmingly Positive status. The game has received 1,000,308 reviews, 97.86 percent of which are positive, and has an overall rating of 97.11 percent. Overwhelmingly Positive games are those with a rating of over 95 percent and at least 500 reviews. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Xbox will return to the Tokyo Game Show 2022
    Xbox will be returning digitally to the Tokyo Game Show 2022. Its livestream will take place on 15th September (9am UK time), curated for players in Japan and Asia. The stream will include updates on existing games from Xbox Game Studios, plus games from third party developers. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Detroit: Become Human developer Quantic Dream bought by Diablo Immortal publisher NetEase
    The video game acquisitions continue: this time it's French developer Quantic Dream, which has been bought by Chinese game company NetEase. NetEase, which publishes Blizzard's mobile game Diablo Immortal, said it had acquired the studio behind Detroit: Become Human, Heavy Rain and Beyond: Two Souls without disclosing a fee. NetEase originally acquired a minority stake in Quantic Dream in 2019. Quantic Dream, led by David Cage and Guillaume de Fondaumière, is now NetEase's first studio in Europe. It will "continue to operate independently, focusing on creating and publishing its video games on all platforms, as well as supporting and publishing third-party developed titles, while at the same time leveraging NetEase's significant game development capabilities", the company insisted. Read more  ( 16 min )
    New combat details revealed for God of War Ragnarök
    New details have emerged about the combat in God of War Ragnarök, including how Kratos can "play with this food". The information comes from an interview with lead combat designers Mihir Sheth and Denny Yeh by Game Informer. In Ragnarök, players will have more options than ever to dish out damage to enemies, controlling both Kratos and Atreus in unison. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Dream Cycle review – chaotic procgen spellcraft from one of Tomb Raider’s original creators
    Dream Cycle is the first game I've played that puts a fresh spin on Blink, Dishonored's widely imitated short-range teleport spell. Admittedly, it's less about the ability in itself, than how it works with and against the game’s sporadically coherent terrain. In Dishonored, Blink is sort of headshots but for movement, snapping you between points with toe-curling specificity. It takes the stodge out of vertical exploration and edits plodding stealth into a series of catlike pounces. It plays that role in Dream Cycle, too, especially when combined with levitation and silenced SMGs. But it's also, here, a means of spelunking through a world that doesn’t quite want to be explored. If you've done any caving yourself, you'll be familiar with the mingled temptation and dread when you spot a…  ( 20 min )
    September’s PS Plus Essential games have leaked
    September's PS Plus Essential games will be Need for Speed Heat, Toem, and Granblue Fantasy Versus. That's according to reliable source Dealabs, who routinely leaks the games in advance. Need for Speed Heat was the 2019 entry to the series and the last to be developed by Ghost Games before being handed back to original developer Criterion. Read more
    Sony, Tencent increase stake in Elden Ring developer FromSoftware
    Sony and Tencent have increased their shareholding in Elden Ring developer FromSoftware. Sony now owns 14.09 percent of the Japanese company, while Tencent, via its Sixjoy subsidiary, now owns 16.25 percent. Existing majority shareholder Kadokawa still owns most of FromSoftware, at 69.66 percent. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The Sims 4's latest Kit DLCs bring kids' fashion and desert-inspired furnishings
    Just over a month after the launch of The Sims 4's High School Years expansion, EA has announced another round of bite-sized Kit DLC releases, this time with a focus on children's wear and desert-inspired furnishings. Both Kits launch next month, starting with The Sims 4 First Fits Kit on 1st September. This one's all about expanded child Sims' clothing options with a bunch of 'fashionable and cute' outfits, some of which you can see in the header image above. "Dress child Sims in trendy looks that are perfect for birthday parties, the classroom or just hanging out with friends," explains EA. "Start your child Sims on a lifetime of trend-setting fashion and allow them to express themselves with the kinds of leopard-print jackets, patterned leggings and colorful shades they’ll want to wear when they grow up." Read more  ( 15 min )
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    Hitman-gängets James Bond släpps kanske inte förrän tidigast 2025
    Io tar höjd för mindre inkomster under kommande år.  ( 6 min )
    Sju minuter rent gameplay från The Last of Us Part I
    Välkommen till Bills stad.  ( 6 min )
    Klart! Kinesiska jätten Netease köper Quantic Dream
    Studion ska dock behålla sitt oberoende arbetssätt.  ( 6 min )
    The Last of Us Part I
    Last of Us-remaken är ett grafiskt storverk, men bortom detta likadant – och lika bra.  ( 10 min )
    Konami ska avslöja nytt på Tokyo Game Show, nämner "älskad" serie
    Inte en av de största serierna, hävdar källa.  ( 6 min )
    Moza Racing kontrar Fanatec - släpper "budgetratt" med direct drive-teknik
    Kostar i runda slängar 7 000 kronor.  ( 6 min )
    Sony och Tencent köper 30 % av Elden Ring-studion From Software
    From Software tar in pengar för att göra (ännu) bättre spel.  ( 6 min )
    Fifa 23 tycks ha läckt - en månad innan releasen
    Vissa tidiga köpare har kunnat spela det.  ( 6 min )
    Snabbkollen - Har du Game Pass?
    Många använder Microsofts spelprenumeration - gör du?  ( 6 min )
    Kratos har goda möjligheter "leka med maten" i God of War Ragnarök
    Striderna ska alltså ha ännu mer variation och valfrihet.  ( 6 min )
    Team Ninjas Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty har fått en gameplay-trailer
    Från Ninja Gaiden- och Nioh-utvecklarna.  ( 6 min )
    Bilder på Logitechs bärbara spelkonsol har läckt
    Och fokus tycks ligga på molnspelande.  ( 6 min )
    FMV-spelet Immortality får riktigt höga betyg
    Från skaparen av Her Story och Telling Lies.  ( 6 min )
    Netflix Cyberpunk Edgerunners får barnförbjuden trailer och premiärdatum
    Blodigt och naket, som vanligt i framtiden.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    God of War Ragnarok will feature a "whole new suite of moves"
    A new suite of moves will be available to players in God of War Ragnarok. This is according Game Informer which spoke with the game's lead combat designers. In the game, Triangle attacks have changed to Weapon Signature Moves that will have the Leviathan Axe or Blades of Chaos at your disposal. Kratos can infuse the weapons with either ice or fire - known as Frost Awaken and Whiplash. These elemental powers will help do extra damage to enemies by freezing them or putting them alight. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Pokemon Go's Season of Light will see the debut of the Legendary Pokemon Cosmog
    Pokemon Go's Season of Light kicks off tomorrow, September 1, and it sees the return of Professor Willow along with the debut of the Legendary Pokemon Cosmog. Special Research will unlock over the Season, so make sure to keep an eye on your Research tab. Raids during the Season of Light will feature Deoxys in Normal, Attack, Defense, and Speed forms, and the Research Breakthrough will focus on Medicham. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Last of Us Part I review – A PS5 remake that shines above most
    You wouldn’t know it if you don’t read “Terrible Take Twitter” or the “Irate Internet,” but there’s been a lot of negativity around the remake of The Last of Us for PS5, subtly renamed to The Last of Us: Part 1. The gist of this anger is due to the original game on PS3 releasing a little over nine years ago. So, how dare Naughty Dog remake a game that new, right? Frankly, I don’t care what projects a game development studio decides to take on, and in this particular instance the handwringing over an extensively spruced up remake feels rather performative. My take: this is a superb remake of an already brilliant game that brings it up to the standard people expect from a modern Naughty Dog game. It’s easily one of the best remakes I’ve ever played. If you are coming to The Last of Us for the first time, what you’ve got is essentially a zombie apocalypse scenario, but we don’t call them zombies – they're the infected and they come in variety of horrific forms, such as Runners, Stalkers, and Clickers (the latter gives me shivers just reading the name). Joel, a bearded, gruff man, suffers a terrible loss when things take a dramatic turn, only for him to find Ellie, a teenage girl, in his care as they venture into hostile lands on a delivery mission. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Cyberpunk: Edgerunners anime series will debut on Netflix September 13
    The premiere date for anime series Cyberpunk: Edgerunners has been set for September 13. The show will debut on Netflix and all 10 episodes of the standalone series will premiere at the same time. Alongside the announcement of the official release date comes a trailer for the show and it rather "bloody" so it may not be safe for work. The show tells the story of David Martinez, a street kid trying to survive in a technology and body modification-obsessed city.In the aftermath of a personal tragedy, he decides to take control of his destiny by becoming an edgerunner, a mercenary outlaw also known as a cyberpunk. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Minecraft Legends is full of character, oozes authenticity, looks brilliant… and is a bit like Brutal Legend
    Credit where credit is due: Mojang has made some incredibly smart bets about ways to expand the Minecraft franchise. Back when Microsoft announced its purchase of the studio and its monolithic IP, I struggled to imagine exactly what could be done with Minecraft beyond the base game. Sure, that would continue to expand and grow – but did people really want to do anything else in that universe? At the time, I reasoned that it didn’t matter if the universe could expand or not. Minecraft alone was big enough and important enough that it was worth every penny of the $2.5 billion Microsoft paid for it. But then, something magical happened: Mojang kept making smart partnerships that expanded the universe in brilliant and often unexpected ways. Lego Minecraft went from a one-off set for nerds to a fully-fledged series of toys, beloved by children everywhere. Minecraft Story Mode released its first episode not long after the acquisition, and then 2019’s Minecraft Dungeons, which was a truly brilliant pairing of the established traditions of Minecraft with a kid-friendly Diablo clone. The Pokemon Go-like Minecraft Earth was a swing-and-a-miss – but that was an AR mobile game that launched right before a pandemic locked everybody indoors - so I’ll give them a pass. Read more  ( 19 min )
    PS+ September leak claims Need for Speed Heat, TOEM, and Granblue Fantasy Versus are coming
    It looks as though September’s PS+ games may have been leaked, thanks to the usual sources over at Dealabs. According to leaker Billbil Kun, Need For Speed Heat, TOEM, and Granblue Fantasy Vs will be available to download for those who pay for a PlayStation + subscription. Despite the previous leaks from Dealabs, take all this with a grain of salt. Leaks of this nature, regardless of prior accuracy, can always turn out false. So we recommend not getting too excited (or disappointed) by the games included. The first title leaks for the September line up is Need For Speed Heat, allegedly available on PS4 consoles during the month. This is the latest entry into the legendary car racing series released back in 2019, and was released as a sort of celebration of the IPs 25th anniversary. We reviewed this game back in the day and gave it four stars out of five, concluding that “Need For Speed has remembered why people used to play it so religiously, and recognised the more recent elements that put them off.” A return to form for the series, well worth downloading. Read more  ( 16 min )
    6 years later, it looks like the System Shock remake was worth the wait
    Without System Shock, we wouldn’t have Prey. We wouldn’t have BioShock. We wouldn’t have Dead Space – and, in fact, it’s Dead Space that’s the most notable in this list, because Visceral’s body-horror masterpiece was initially conceived as a System Shock sequel. System Shock, and its direct sequel, defined the horror genre and – to a degree – how we tell stories in games. But it’s likely a part of games history that’s lost on a lot of people. Games that came along later, were available on more platforms, and appealed more to a generation of game-players on Twitter and social media platforms, redefined survival horror. Ken Levine and his action/horror splice of genres in BioShock stole System Shock’s thunder, and morphed the entire genre into its own image. Visceral and Dead Space shunted the genre into the hands of Call of Duty players. Both helped usher the genre away from survival horror, and more towards action horror. Glen Schofield gleefully watching on as one million Isaac Clarkes shot off countless alien limbs, Ken Levine purred as one million Booker DeWitts found one million lighthouses and predicted one million plot twists. Each of these games toyed with genre convention to deliver something markedly different from System Shock… yet neither of them would exist without Looking Glass Studios’ masterful debut. Read more  ( 19 min )
    World of Warcraft Lich King Classic's pre-patch is out, ready to do bad DPS again 14 years later?
    Wrath of the Lich King is nearly back in Classic World of Warcraft, thanks to the new expansion pre-patch released to the classic servers. This is big news for the old, the nostalgic, and the “back in my day” crowd, who’ll soon be able to venture back to the frozen wastes of Northrend to take down Arthas all over again. I’m sure you’ll get the mount you always wanted this time, bud. Players can choose to either move onto this wave of new content with their pre-existing characters on Burning Crusade classic servers, or they can hop onto fresh servers to re-level a hero and experience the game with an economy that isn’t totally inflated and loads of guilds actually looking for new members. Wrath of the Lich King is held in high regard in the minds of OG World of Warcraft players, with excellent raids and PvP content while also adding in some quality of life changes that really go a long way in convincing you not to ram your head into your desk — like duel specialisation, a dungeon finder, and more. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Quantic Dream has been acquired by Netease Games — will continue to "operate independently"
    Netease, the developer and publisher behind numerous titles including Naraka: Bladepoint and Diablo Immortal has announced the latest studio to be brought under their umbrella: Quantic Dream. This French developer is known for creating a range of narrative-focused titles including Heavy Rain, Detroit Become: Human, and Beyond Two Souls. This marks the first European company to be acquired by Netease, as the company stretches its financial fingers across the world to pluck up studios left and right. With this particular acquisition, the folks at Netease state the studio will “continue to operate independently” as it develops titles across all platforms. The studio will also apparently continue to support and publish third-party developed titles which is great news if you liked the look of Under the Waves — a game first revealed at Gamescom earlier this month which is published by Quantic Dream and developed by another French team at Parallel Studios. Read more  ( 16 min )
    These 15 Ubisoft games and DLC will go offline tomorrow
    You might remember an article from Ubisoft from a couple of months ago that advised it would be decommissioning the online services for multiple games as of September 1. Well, that time has come, and it's one more day until these 15 Ubisoft titles go offline forever. In the grand world of video games, we're well aware that nothing lasts forever; even though, really, we should be discussing video game preservation more often. Today is the last day that online multiplayer will be available in any of the fifteen titles, but also the final day that you'll be able to play any DLC you own - multiplayer or not. One example pointed out by a Reddit user is that those who bought the expansions for Assassin's Creed 3's 2012 release will no longer be able to access the DLC without buying the remaster of the game, and those with Splinter Cell Blacklist cosmetics will not be able to use them. Read more  ( 18 min )
    FromSoftware may soon publish its own games thanks to new investments from Sony and Tencent
    FromSoftware, the Japanese studio that went from a niche developer that produces mini-hits, to the creator of Elden Ring - 2022's best-selling game so far - is and has been a hot target for acquisition and acquisition speculation. But while FromSoftware has not been bought by any big player, major companies are quickly buying up stock in Kadokawa, the corporation that owns FromSoftware. Kadokawa announced this morning in a press release [PDF] that it has issued new shares of its stock in FromSoftware to Chinese giant Tencent, and Sony Interactive Entertainment. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Earth: Revival hands-on – 5 reasons you should be excited for this multiplayer open world sci-fi survival game
    There are games that pit you against the elements in tough battles for survival, such as Rust, DayZ, and Valheim. Then there are games that take you on a grand sci-fi adventure with your friends, like Destiny and Outriders. But what if there was a game that let you do both? Enter Earth: Revival, an ambitious blend of survival gaming and shared-world shooting, that takes place on Earth following an alien invasion. We've taken Nuverse's intriguing hybrid for a spin, and jotted down five reasons why you should be excited about Earth: Revival. Earth: Revival's takes place in the shadow of global catastrophe, with a setting that blends near-future sci-fi and post-apocalyptic storytelling. Set in 2112, Earth: Revival takes place on a ravaged and destroyed planet Earth, a result of an intergalactic conflict with a mysterious alien species. As Survivors of the war against the aliens, players will fight to reclaim Earth and restore what was lost. The world of Earth: Revival is vast, diverse and dangerous. On their journey, players will explore numerous open environments, from a rid deserts to snow-filled valleys to dense, futuristic cityscapes. But don't be fooled by what beauty Earth still retains. Its wildernesses are intensely hostile, with players contending against acid-rain, sandstorms and clouds of alien spores. Cities, meanwhile, are prowled by gangs and mercenary factions. To survive, you must gather resources and utilise 3D printing technology to create useful items and equipment, ranging from crucial survival gear to vehicles that help them traverse the world more easily. You'll also need to manage your basic bodily needs, cooking food to maintain energy, purifying water to avoid becoming sick, and building cabins for shelter and as a base of operations. Read more  ( 17 min )
  • Open

    Arcane Waters is an upcoming open-world pixel-pirate adventure game
    Want to sail the high seas? Love pixel artwork? Check out the upcoming game Arcane Waters which will let you do some pirating adventures alone or online with others too but it's mainly an online focused game.  ( 5 min )
    Steam Deck Tips and Tricks Part 2
    Since a lot of people liked the first set of tips and tricks for the Steam Deck, here's a Part 2 with just a few more that some of you might find useful.  ( 6 min )
    Futuristic drift-racer Neodash is out now on Steam and looks wild
    Neodash is a fresh Native Linux racing game that combines futuristic bright neon visuals with crazy-fast drifting.  ( 4 min )
    The Zachtronics Solitaire Collection releases September 6
    Okay so perhaps Last Call BBS being their actual final game was a sweet little lie from Zachtronics. Well, sort of, as The Zachtronics Solitaire Collection is technically not exactly a new game.  ( 4 min )
    Infinity Engine reimplementation GemRB continues improving Icewind Dale 2
    Classics like Baldur's Gate, Planescape: Torment, Icewind Dale and more running on the Infinity Engine should live on forever thanks to open source reimplementations like GemRB.  ( 4 min )
    SokoChess combines Chess with the Sokoban block-pushing formula
    SokoChess is certainly an intriguing game blending together two very different types of gameplay, to create something that's a little peculiar but quite fun.  ( 4 min )
    Valheim gets patched to prevent the world resetting
    Quite an important update has rolled out for the open-world survival game Valheim, with a bunch of changes related to the saving system to prevent some big problems.  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Moderskeppet nära fullbokat – detta händer ombord
    Kryssningen Moderskeppet är på väg att bli en riktig succé och nu är det dags att presentera programmet ombord. Häng med!  ( 7 min )
    LG visar böjbara 42-tummaren OLED Flex
    LG kontrar Corsairs böjbara OLED-skärm med egna varianten OLED Flex LX3 på 42 tum som låter användaren kontrollera krökningen med inbyggda motorer.  ( 6 min )
    LG visar upp böjbara 42-tummaren OLED Flex
    LG kontrar Corsairs böjbara OLED-skärm med egna varianten OLED Flex LX3 på 42 tum som låter användaren kontrollera krökningen med inbyggda motorer.  ( 6 min )
    Nvidias grafikkortsförsäljning har sjunkit med 26 procent
    Enligt ny rapport från Jon Peddie Research har Nvidias grafikkortsförsäljning sjunkit med en fjärdedel under årets andra kvartal.  ( 6 min )
    Ryzen 9 7950X dyker upp i Geekbench
    AMD:s kommande flaggskepp i Ryzen 7000-familjen bekänner färg i testsviten Geekbench, där prestandan som väntat tar ett rejält kliv upp mot föregående generation.  ( 6 min )
    Veckans fråga: När uppgraderar du till DDR5?
    Snabbare minnen enligt DDR5-standarden är här och fler plattformar med stöd närmar sig. Den här veckan undrar Kingston när du planerar att ta klivet över.  ( 6 min )
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    Russell Coker: Links Aug 2022
    Armor is an interesting technology from Manchester University for stopping rowhammer attacks on DRAM [1]. Unfortunately “armor” is a term used for DRAM that looks fancy for ricers so finding out whether it’s used in production is difficult. The Reckless Limitless Scope of Web Browsers is an insightful analysis of the size of web specs and why it’s impossible to implement them properly [2]. Framework is a company that makes laptop kits you can assemble and upgrade, interesting concept [3]. I’ll keep buying second hand laptops for less than $400 but if I wanted to spend $1000 then I’d consider one of these. FS has an insightful article about why unstructured job interviews (IE the vast majority of job interviews) give a bad result [4]. How a child killer inspired Ayn Rand and indirectly cons…  ( 14 min )
    Raphaël Hertzog: Freexian’s report about Debian Long Term Support, July 2022
    Like each month, have a look at the work funded by Freexian’s Debian LTS offering. Debian project funding No any major updates on running projects. Two 1, 2 projects are in the pipeline now. Tryton project is in a review phase. Gradle projects is still fighting in work. In July, we put aside 2389 EUR to fund Debian projects. We’re looking forward to receive more projects from various Debian teams! Learn more about the rationale behind this initiative in this article. Debian LTS contributors In July, 14 contributors have been paid to work on Debian LTS, their reports are available: Abhijith PA did 0.00h (out of 14.00h assigned, thus carrying over 14.00h to the next month). Andreas Rönnquist did 0.00h (out of 0.00h assigned and 10.50h from previous period, thus carrying over 10.50h to the ne…  ( 7 min )
    Wouter Verhelst: Not currently uploading
    A notorious ex-DD decided to post garbage on his site in which he links my name to the suicide of Frans Pop, and mentions that my GPG key is currently disabled in the Debian keyring, along with some manufactured screenshots of the Debian NM site that allegedly show I'm no longer a DD. I'm not going to link to the post -- he deserves to be ridiculed, not given attention. Just to set the record straight, however: Frans Pop was my friend. I never treated him with anything but respect. I do not know why he chose to take his own life, but I grieved for him for a long time. It saddens me that Mr. Notorious believes it a good idea to drag Frans' name through the mud like this, but then, one can hardly expect anything else from him by this point. Although his post is mostly garbage, there is one bit of information that is correct, and that is that my GPG key is currently no longer in the Debian keyring. Nothing sinister is going on here, however; the simple fact of the matter is that I misplaced my OpenPGP key card, which means there is a (very very slight) chance that a malicious actor (like, perhaps, Mr. Notorious) would get access to my GPG key and abuse that to upload packages to Debian. Obviously we can't have that -- certainly not from him -- so for that reason, I asked the Debian keyring maintainers to please disable my key in the Debian keyring. I've ordered new cards; as soon as they arrive I'll generate a new key and perform the necessary steps to get my new key into the Debian keyring again. Given that shipping key cards to South Africa takes a while, this has taken longer than I would have initially hoped, but I'm hoping at this point that by about halfway September this hurdle will have been taken, meaning, I will be able to exercise my rights as a Debian Developer again. As for Mr. Notorious, one can only hope he will get the psychiatric help he very obviously needs, sooner rather than later, because right now he appears to be more like a goat yelling in the desert. Ah well.  ( 2 min )
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    Sippery Slope
    No content preview
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    Genode OS Framework 22.08 With Improvements For Mobile Phone OS Ambitions
    Genode OS as the open-source operating system framework based on a micro-kernel abstraction layer and a set of user-space components is out with its newest feature release. A big focus this cycle has been on making Genode OS more practical as a smartphone operating system...  ( 5 min )
    MGLRU Linux Performance Looking Very Good For OpenWrt Router Use
    For those running the embedded OpenWrt Linux operating system for routers and other networking devices or just running a memory-constrained MIPS Linux system, the forthcoming Multi-Gen LRU "MGLRU" kernel feature is looking very good on that front...  ( 4 min )
    QEMU 7.1 Released With LoongArch Support, Zero-Copy-Send Migration
    QEMU 7.1 is now available as the latest feature release for this processor emulator that plays an important role in the open-source Linux virtualization stack...  ( 5 min )
    NVIDIA Proprietary Driver Causes Last Minute Headache For Ubuntu 20.04.5 LTS
    Earlier this month Ubuntu 22.04.1 LTS was delayed by one week due to an OEM install bug leading to broken Snaps support. Now with Ubuntu 20.04.5 LTS the Canonical developers are racing down to a last-minute rebuild of images over a NVIDIA proprietary driver issue...  ( 5 min )
    Apache Talks Up More Than 333 Million OpenOffice Downloads
    While Apache OpenOffice development is rather stagnate, many of the original OpenOffice.org developers left for LibreOffice long ago, and LibreOffice has been delivering far more modern features and functionality, people continue to download OpenOffice. This week the Apache Software Foundation is celebrating more than 333 million downloads of their open-source office suite...  ( 5 min )
    Archinstall 2.5-rc1 For Easily Installing Arch Linux
    A new release of Archinstall, an easy-to-use, text-based Arch Linux installer, is on the way...  ( 4 min )
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    Jailbirds
    a comic about being free as a bird  ( 1 min )
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    Don’t Suspend Ubuntu When Laptop Lid is Closed
    Learn how to change the lid closing behavior with Ubuntu and make it not go in suspend mode when the laptop lid is closed.  ( 23 min )
    21 Basic Linux Networking Commands You Should Know
    A list of basic Linux networking commands that will help you troubleshoot network issues, monitor packets, connect devices, and much more.  ( 35 min )
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    Comic for 2022.08.31 - Year 2009 part 2
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )
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    Universe Price Tiers
    No content preview  ( 1 min )

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    Here's 7 minutes of The Last Of Us: Part 1's remake
    The Last Of Us Part I's remake is heading to PlayStation 5 on September 2nd, which I assume is of modest interest if you want to play Joel and Ellie's story over from the beginning with prettier graphics. It's more interesting to us in PC land because it'll be the first time the heart-and-zombie smasher makes its way to PC - albeit "very soon" after its console release. Below, a new seven-minute clip of the remaster in action. Read more  ( 16 min )
    GTA5's best graphics mod is now available for free download
    Most 'realistic graphics' mods make games look worse, but that's not the case with NaturalVision Evolved. The long-in-development Grand Theft Auto 5 mod is a comprehensive revamp of lighting, textures, models and much more, but it remains faithful to the art direction of the base game. You can now download a Single Player Beta of the mod - and even if you don't plan on doing that, it's worth watching the trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Paradox's next grand strategy simulation will launch in October
    For years, every Paradox game-related stream or video I've seen has had "where's Victoria 3?" and "Viccy 3 when?" in the comments underneath. The grand strategy sequel was finally announced last year, more than ten years after the release of Victoria 2, and now we have a release date as well: October 25th. What will people put in the comments underneath Paradox game trailers now? Hop below for the answer (and a release date trailer). Read more  ( 16 min )
    The cheap and cheerful Crucial P2 NVMe drive is especially cheap today
    The Crucial P2 is a great value NVMe SSD, and now the 2TB model is down to £117 at Amazon UK - an incredibly low price for a drive that can hit 2400MB/s. The 1TB model has also been discounted in the same sale, from £86 to £63, making it cheaper than many SATA SSDs of the same size. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Get 20% extra off Amazon Warehouse items in the UK
    Amazon is running one of its periodic Warehouse sales, offering a further 20% off the listed price at the checkout on a wide range of used items. This has historically been a great time to pick up PC components and peripherals in like new condition for much lower than new prices, so let's see what we can find, shall we? Read more  ( 16 min )
    ORX review early access: a moreish tower defence roguelike that already has strong foundations
    The thrill of a card game is in the hand you get dealt. Luck can either be on your side, or you can earn it back by using your wits, carving out a victory you never thought possible. Other times, it all goes to pot and you get absolutely walloped, but hot damn if you didn't go down fighting. ORX has these moments in spades. Part deckbuilder, part roguelike and part tower defence, this is a real-time strategy game played by the seat of your pants, where a rolling deck of cards determines not only what kind of defences you can build, but also what buffs, spells and additional forces you can deploy to help defend your keep from the oncoming hordes. It's a gripping mix that's already claimed over a dozen hours of my time in recent weeks, and it's a number I can only see going up and up and up as it continues to develop in early access. Read more  ( 21 min )
    Blank screens and a bad neck: hands-on with the Samsung Odyssey Ark monitor
    While mooching around Samsung’s Gamescom booth, waiting for their 990 Pro SSD reveal, I took the opportunity to play with an altogether more unusual addition to their hardware catalogue. The Samsung Odyssey Ark, for the unfamiliar, is a kind of all-in-one entertainment screen: a mammoth 55in Mini LED panel that can act as a desktop gaming monitor or living room TV, complete with honking great speakers and built-in support for all the big game streaming services so you can play on it without a PC or console. Unlike other monitors of this magnitude, it can also rotate into portrait mode, leaving the top curve towering over you like an unsympathetic Victorian headmaster. I actually enjoy a touch of design madness creeping into the occasional piece of PC gear, regardless of whether it can hang with the best gaming monitors that sensible people might buy. What I experienced with the Odyssey Ark, however, was a device that too often veered onto the wrong side of senseless – when it was even working properly. Read more  ( 18 min )
    The next Assassin’s Creed game is called Mirage, rumours claim
    Back in February, Alice O. highlighted an expansion planned for Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla that’s reportedly being spun-off into a standalone stealth game. At the time the project was being referred to as Rift, but multiple sources are now saying the game will be called Assassin’s Creed: Mirage. Both Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier and Giant Bomb’s Jeff Grubb say they’ve been told by people familiar with the game that Mirage is accurate. Read more  ( 17 min )
    We'll have to wait for MultiVersus local co-op, game director says
    Warner Bros’ licensed brawler MultiVersus won’t be getting support for local couch co-op anytime soon, game director Tony Huynh has said. Huynh was replying to a question on Twitter about whether the MultiVersus team were working on implementing that most Nineties of features. Speaking of Nineties nostalgia, you can watch a retro trailer for MultiVersus below. Makes me feel ten again. Read more  ( 16 min )
    New World's first expansion Brimstone Sands promises an early game revamp
    New World is getting its first major expansion in the form of Brimstone Sands, an arid endgame location for players to contest that comes bundled with a bunch of early game streamlining, and a brand-new weapon, too. I got hands-on with the expansion's first hour or so and had a chat with the game's creative director about it all. One year on, is it everything the game needs to satisfy long-time fans and attract newcomers? Yes! Well. Maybe...? Read more  ( 19 min )
    Victoria 3's Pop system is so detailed that your country basically doesn't need you around
    I'm going to level with you: I'm not a GSG player. I play strategy, sure, but grand strategy has always been a bit beyond me. I'm a fundamentally un-grand person; I spend most days dressed like a 14-year-old fan of Tony Hawk, I do not like olives or scallops, and I'm unable to predict the consequences of actions if they exist outside of, say, a 12 month timeframe. A game like Victoria 3, where the whole point is making decisions that have country-wide effects and outcomes years in the future, is essentially operating in a different language to any I understand. I'm trying to learn new languages, though, so it's not an unwelcome challenge. The problem is that previewing Victoria 3 is quite an advanced level to dive in, the Paradox GSG equivalent of being a live translator for a UN summit when you're only just about able to read the French version of The Famous Five. In a presentation before I and others were let loose on the better part of a week with the game, it was claimed that Victoria 3 is the best yet for onboarding newcomers, with a deep and detailed tutorial system. And to that I say: kinda. Luckily, the AI in Victoria 3 is so advanced it's better at playing the game than I am. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Sega's sci-fi shooter Hyenas has left me with more questions than answers
    Of all the games I saw at this year's Gamescom, sci-fi team-based shooter Hyenas easily claims the title of "Most Confusing Overall Experience". Bouncing between appointments in this sea of booths and lanyards was jarring, but I'd eventually settle in after a few minutes of reconfiguring my brain to whatever presentation or control scheme was placed in front of me. Hyenas never gave me a chance. I sat in a 20-minute presentation of the game and tried my level best to understand SEGA's stab at a live-service FPS. Instead, I exited the booth with whiplash... and a sense of curiosity. Somewhere inside the game's insufferable tone is a kernel of cleverness, I just need to get my mitts on it to confirm my suspicions. Otherwise, it's very difficult to really understand whether it can survive in such a saturated space. Read more  ( 18 min )
    The original Mafia is going free on Steam for a limited time to mark the series 20th anniversary
    Mafia devs Hangar 13 are going to make you an offer you can’t refuse. The first instalment in the crime sim series will be free on Steam for a limited time beginning on September 1st. The giveaway is to celebrate the Mafia series’ 20th anniversary, as the original game was released on August 29th 2002 in the US and September 6th in Europe. If the trilogy passed you by or you want to refresh your memory then publishers 2K have put together a 20th anniversary trailer, which you can watch below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    AMD Ryzen 7000: prices, specs, and release date confirmed
    AMD have, at long last, fully unveiled the Ryzen 7000 series of gaming CPUs – specs, pricing, the lot. There’s even a release date, September 27th, which will see AMD launch an initial salvo of four mid-to-high-end chips. These will aim to leapfrog Intel’s 12th Gen Alder Lake processors, several of which are among the best CPUs for gaming we’ve yet tried, with the aid of a new Zen 4 core design, DDR5/PCIe 5.0 support and some ambitious clock speed boosts. Read more  ( 21 min )
    Back 4 Blood’s Children Of The Worm DLC is out today and stars a preacher with a glorious 'tache
    Mutant-battling co-op horror shooter Back 4 Blood sees the arrival of a moustachioed new character and some very angry enemies with its second DLC pack today, Children Of The Worm. There's also fresh campaign missions, weapons and cards. Watch the trailer below, and my heartfelt condolences to anyone from Ireland. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Immortality review: a peeling apart of stories, power and film that can't quite balance on a knife edge
    Drumroll, please, for the latest interactive, live action, film archival puzzle from Sam Barlow, of Her Story and Telling Lies. This latest rumination on voyeurism also delves into storytelling, sex, death, religion, love, lust, lies, pretence (as distinct from acting), power and self. That's a lot to pack into the partial, out of order clips of three different films, which manage to span both decades and careers. The central figure is Marissa Marcel, an almost-star actor who made three movies before disappearing. So the question you strive to answer, by looking through unedited takes and rehearsal footage, is: what happened to Marissa Marcel? In typical Barlow fashion, the entirety of the footage isn't easily spooled through. From one starting clip you're able to watch it, flick back and forth through the recording, and pause it to use the in-game search tool to focus on a face or object on screen. Selecting it will then take you to that face or a similar object in a different clip, and eventually you build up a much fuller catalogue of footage. Now. Immortality also talks quite a bit about sex, in various ways and for various reasons, and there is female nudity. So yes, you can enhance! Zoom! on a tit. And the game will take you to another clip featuring a similar tit. Ba-dum, tsh! Read more  ( 21 min )
    World Of Warcraft: Wrath Of The Lich King Classic’s pre-patch resurrects Death Knights today
    World Of Warcraft Classic returns to the Wrath Of The Lich King expansion in September, but there’s a pre-patch coming today that resurrects the game’s first hero class a little early. The Death Knights aren’t the only thing arriving in WOW Classic before the expansion though, as there’s a fresh profession and a zombie infestation to consider too. Have a watch of some of the senior dev team discussing Death Knights in the video below. Read more  ( 17 min )
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    JPR: Unit Sales of Nvidia GPUs Down 26 Percent as PC Sales Collapse
    Sales of CPUs drop by 33.7% year-over-year in Q2 2022, JPR says.  ( 59 min )
    Grab a Gaming Laptop for $549! Intel 12th Gen HP Victus Drops to New Low
    Best Buy is offering the HP Victus 15 for $549, knocking a whopping $250 off the price.  ( 62 min )
    Meteor Lake CPUs Could Play Videos, Use QuickSync Without a GPU
    According to new Linux patch notes for Meteor Lake enablement, the media engine on Meteor Lake processors will move off the integrated graphics chip into its own unit.  ( 59 min )
    AeroCool Skribble Case Invites PC DIYers to Create Some Art
    The AeroCool Skribble case comes with a liquid chalk marker and a wiper, so you can change or erase designs. Other than this artsy feature, it looks like a pretty standard mid-tower case with an RGB fan included.  ( 63 min )
    TSMC Says a Shortage of Commodity Chips Is Disrupting Trillion-Dollar Industries
    TSMC says a shortage of inexpensive "commodity chips" is disrupting trillion dollar industries. Even ASML currently suffers from insufficient chip supply of these chips.  ( 59 min )
    Raspberry Pi Turns Typewriter into Working Linux Terminal
    Maker Riley with Artillect is using a Raspberry Pi to convert a vintage electronic typewriter into a functional Linux terminal.  ( 62 min )
    AMD Demonstrates Working 5nm RDNA 3 Chiplet GPU
    AMD demonstrated working RDNA 3 silicon at its Ryzen 7000 launch event, running Lies of P. Given the timeframe, we wouldn't expect Radeon RX 7000 until November at earliest.  ( 61 min )
    Former Employee: T-Mobile Misleads Home Internet Customers
    Says company’s support reps incentivized to give customers false excuses to get them off the phone faster.  ( 65 min )
    Pick up a Razer Mouse, Headset, Keyboard and Mouse Pad for Just $40: Real Deals
    We have some excellent discounts on some of Razer's most popular PC peripherals, including a Razer Power Up Gaming bundle deal for just $40.  ( 66 min )
    CPU-Z Update Shows Support for Non-X Ryzen 9 7900 and 7950
    Patch notes for CPU-Z update 2.02 show hidden support for two new non-X variants of AMD's Ryzen 9 7000 series CPUs, the Ryzen 9 7900 and 7950, hinting at power efficient alternatives to the halo X-series parts.  ( 59 min )
    FBI Warns of Increased Cybercriminal Activity Surrounding Crypto
    The FBI has issued a Public Service Announcement concerning increased cybercriminal activity surrounding the DeFi (Decentralized Finance) landscape, which has already led to the siphoning of billions of investors' dollars.  ( 60 min )
    TSMC Confirms Plans to Start 3nm Production Shortly
    TSMC confirms plans to start making chips using its N3 production node ‘soon,’ with Apple taking the lion's share of initial wafers.  ( 59 min )
    Intel Raptor Lake Desktop Launch Schedule Allegedly Leaks
    The ‘K’ CPUs will launch on Sept 28, with pre-orders opening up over the following fortnight, and availability starting from Oct 20. Sadly, it looks like reviews won’t be published until the general availability date.  ( 59 min )
    Logitech's Steam Deck Rival Leaks With GeForce Now, xCloud Support
    Logitech is releasing a new gaming handheld in 2022, that is believed to be running Android as opposed to Windows or Linux.  ( 60 min )
    Cooler Master CH331 Review: Big Sound, Small Price
    The Cooler Master CH331 is a plug and play surround sound headset for beginner gamers and streamers.  ( 61 min )
    Crucial P3 Plus SSD Review: Capacity on the Cheap
    The P3 Plus is a good first effort at a faster budget SSD with Crucial’s new QLC.  ( 66 min )
    Cooler Master MM311 Review: Performance on a Budget
    Cooler Master’s beginner level gaming mouse is light in your hand and on your wallet.  ( 63 min )
    G.Skill Unveils AMD EXPO-Certified DDR5 RAM For Ryzen 7000 CPUs
    G.Skill launches Trident Z5 Neo and Flare X5 memory kits for AMD's Zen 4 Ryzen 7000 processors.  ( 59 min )
    AMD Launches Zen 4 Ryzen 7000 CPUs, Arrives Sept. 27 Starting at $299
    AMD launched its highly-anticipated Ryzen 7000 series.  ( 74 min )
    AMD Live Blog: Watch Zen 4 Ryzen 7000 Livestream Here at 7PM ET
    AMD CEO Lisa Su takes to the stage to announce the company's new 5nm Zen 4 Ryzen 7000 processors.  ( 99 min )
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    First US death linked to monkeypox reported in immunocompromised adult in Texas
    Officials are still determining the exact cause of death, which occurred August 28.  ( 5 min )
    Leaked Switch-esque portable from Logitech could be great for streaming, emulation
    Logitech and Tencent have announced plans to make a streaming-focused portable.  ( 5 min )
    Portal 2 ends 9 years of Xbox 360 “Games with Gold” freebies
    Subscribers got over 200 Xbox 360 games; previously claimed titles will still work.  ( 5 min )
    These self-morphing 3D wood shapes could be future of wood manufacturing
    Someday, wood furniture could be shipped flat and then dried to form a final shape.  ( 5 min )
    Organizations are spending billions on malware defense that’s easy to bypass
    Two of the simplest forms of evasion are surprisingly effective against EDRs.  ( 6 min )
    Study sees almost a foot of sea level rise locked in for Greenland
    How long that takes to play out is unclear.  ( 6 min )
    Tesla’s ban on pro-union shirts is illegal and must be rescinded, NLRB rules
    Tesla ordered to scrap shirt ban and notify workers that it violated US labor law.  ( 6 min )
    Tweets glorifying self-harm have grown 500% since October, report says
    Researchers listed reasons why Twitter fails to moderate self-harm content.  ( 6 min )
    SmartDry’s useful laundry sensor to be cloud-bricked next month
    Sensor for already dry clothes relied on smartphone app, servers to work.  ( 5 min )
    New technique shows old temperatures were much hotter than thought
    Results imply Earth may be more sensitive to carbon dioxide than previously known.  ( 5 min )
    France reveals hidden swimming pools with AI, taxes them
    Computer eyes in the skies make real estate tax evasion in France much harder.  ( 4 min )
    To save lives, issue connected vehicle technology waiver, NTSB tells FCC
    The FCC left 30 MHz of bandwidth for C-V2X applications.  ( 5 min )
    The Telegram-powered news outlet waging guerilla war on Russia
    February Morning has become a central player in underground fight against the Kremlin.  ( 6 min )
    Android 13 review: Plans for the future, but not much to offer today
    Android 13 is a very small update, but it's also the second one this year.  ( 6 min )
    AMD makes Ryzen 7000 official: Launching September 27, starting at $299
    Company promises a big 29% jump in single-core CPU performance from Ryzen 5000.  ( 7 min )
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    VMware CEO bats away Broadcom concerns – it’s just ‘the next transition’
    And so is vSphere for Arm: CEO tells Reg he’s ‘beating up’ the exec responsible for the port VMware Explore  VMware is working to bring its flagship virtualization stack to all major processor architectures, CEO Raghu Raghuram said at his company’s Explore conference in San Francisco today.…  ( 5 min )
    Googler says she was forced out after opposing $1.2bn cloud contract with Israel
    Fears of human-rights abuses overshadow Project Nimbus Ariel Koren, a Jewish Googler, claims the internet giant pressured her into resigning in retaliation for her speaking out about Google and Amazon's $1.2 billion cloud contract with Israel's government and military.…  ( 5 min )
    Ubuntu Linux 18.04 systemd security patch breaks DNS in Microsoft Azure
    Snafu disrupts VMs as cloud giant offers workarounds Microsoft Azure customers running Canonical's Ubuntu 18.04 (aka Bionic Beaver) in the cloud have seen their applications fail after a flawed security update to systemd broke DNS queries.…  ( 5 min )
    Official: Arm-based VMs available on Azure
    Support going live in 10 Azure regions, running on Ampere Altra Microsoft has opened up Arm-based virtual machines for general availability on its Azure cloud platform, after previewing the technology earlier this year.…  ( 4 min )
    Tesla faces fresh lawsuit alleging phantom braking
    Automaker accused of hiding malfunctioning tech from drivers A lawsuit filed against Tesla this month accuses the automaker of covering up an alleged malfunction that makes vehicles stop for nonexistent objects, sometimes in the middle of traffic, while in Autopilot mode.…  ( 4 min )
    Teradata takes on cloud-native rivals with data lakes, MLOps
    Reworked use of object storage changes footing with competitors but will need to convince devs Teradata has launched analytics and data lake platforms as it strives to steal the march on so-call cloud-native enterprise data warehouse companies.…  ( 5 min )
    Dell intros updated VxRail and dedicated AI platform with VMware
    HCI platform now supports vSphere 8, vSAN 8, and VCF 4.5 VMware Explore  Dell has announced its latest kit co-developed with VMware, including updated VxRail HCI systems with support for network offloading to DPUs, support for VMware's Tanzu Kubernetes Grid in its Apex subscription platform, and a turnkey platform for operating AI workloads.…  ( 5 min )
    Chips still down for Toyota: Low semiconductor supplies dampen output
    Production dips almost 7% between January and July. COVID-19 disruption also blamed Semiconductor shortages might have peaked in some sectors but the automotive industry is still reaching to secure as many chips as it can, with Toyota outlining the continued ramifications.…  ( 4 min )
    VMware reckons 20% of server cores can come back to work thanks to vSphere 8 and SmartNICs
    Re-composes automation and management tools as ‘Aria’, reduces cloud hardware requirements, tries to reinvent security ... again VMware Explore  VMware has delivered on its promise to brings its flagship vSphere compute virtualization suite to SmartNICs that embed a small computer on a network interface controller and run network-centric workloads there to free servers’ CPUs from scutwork.…  ( 7 min )
    Singapore struggles to curb cryptocurrency enthusiasm
    City-state can’t beat them, so plans to regulate them, starting with consumer suitability tests The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) said on Monday it is taking measures to reduce the harms caused by cryptocurrency, including conducting "customer suitability tests" as part of its ongoing slow-motion crackdown on the alternative tender.…  ( 4 min )
    That 'clean' Google Translate app is actually Windows crypto-mining malware
    Ah, nothing like a classic Trojan horse Watch out: someone is spreading cryptocurrency-mining malware disguised as legitimate-looking applications, such as Google Translate, on free software download sites and through Google searches.…  ( 5 min )
    Kylin: The multiple semi-official Chinese versions of Ubuntu
    Investigating the world of Chinese Linux Ubuntu's special distro for the Chinese market has a widening edge over the company's more conventional flavors.…  ( 12 min )
    The International Space Station will deorbit in glory. How's your legacy tech doing?
    Your past projects may be a pain, but can they rain fiery death from above? Opinion  The International Space Station is showing its age. It's older than a third of the population, over two and a half billion people who have never known a time without humans in orbit.…  ( 6 min )
    Microsoft fixes Windows 'idiosyncrasy' that hampered some SMB file transfers
    You might find copying data over a network goes at least a little quicker Microsoft this month fixed what one of its staffers called an "idiosyncrasy" in the end-to-end SMB compression functionality it began rolling out last year for Windows Server 2022 and Windows 11.…  ( 5 min )
    AI detects 20,000 hidden taxable swimming pools in France, netting €10m
    Aerial photo scanning tool to be expanded to catch out other unreported home improvements AI software has detected more than 20,000 secret private swimming pools in aerial photography, helping French tax officials bag about €10 million (£ 8.6 million) in extra property levies.…  ( 4 min )
    Meta picks India for WhatsApp's first e-commerce service
    Indian residents will be able to buy their groceries through the chat app – for as long as the government is happy with the idea Meta's messaging service WhatsApp will launch its first end to end e-commerce service in India, through an alliance with giant conglomerate Reliance Industries’ digital business and mobile telephony subsidiary, Jio Platforms.…  ( 5 min )
    AMD refreshes desktop CPUs with 5nm Ryzen 7000s that reach 5.7GHz with 16 cores
    Prices start at $300, you'll also need a new motherboard, RAM AMD has refreshed its desktop processors for the first time in nearly two years, revealing Ryzen 7000-series processors that boast clock speeds that can reach 5.7GHz and performance up to 29 percent greater than their predecessors.…  ( 7 min )
    Google Play to ban Android VPN apps from interfering with ads
    Developers say this is not the privacy protection it's made out to be Google in November will prohibit Android VPN apps in its Play store from interfering with or blocking advertising, a change that may pose problems for some privacy applications.…  ( 5 min )
    US court backs FCC decision to let SpaceX fly Starlink sats at lower altitudes
    Judges just didn't buy Viasat's in-orbit prang fears Judges in the US have upheld the FCC's decision to allow SpaceX Starlink satellites to fly at a lower altitude.…  ( 5 min )
    FTC sues data broker for selling millions of people's 'precise' location info
    Which would be very problematic in this Post-Roe era The Federal Trade Commission has accused data broker Kochava of trampling over people's privacy by selling the "precise" whereabouts of hundreds of millions of mobile devices.…  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Google Chrome 105 Released With HTML Sanitizer API, Container Queries & More
    Google engineers today promoted Chrome 105 to their stable channel across Linux, macOS, Windows, and Android platforms...  ( 5 min )
    Intel Meteor Lake Thunderbolt Support Slated For Linux 6.1
    The latest Linux hardware enablement work to report on for Intel's Meteor Lake client platform is Thunderbolt support being queued ahead of the Linux 6.1 merge window...  ( 4 min )
    Fwupd 1.8.4 Supports More Hardware, Starts Allowing To Make BIOS Changes From Linux
    Richard Hughes as the lead developer of the Linux Vendor Firmware Service (LVFS) and Fwupd at Red Hat announced the release this morning of Fwupd 1.8.4 as a nice update to this open-source firmware updating utility. Fwupd 1.8.4 not only adds support for some new hardware and fixes but notably begins adding the infrastructure to allow facilitating BIOS changes to the system from within Linux...  ( 5 min )
    Intel Meteor Lake Introducing "Standalone Media" Unit
    With Intel's Meteor Lake moving to a tiled/chiplet approach, we have already seen some interesting changes on the Linux driver side and confirmation of the introduction of a "Versatile Processing Unit" coming with Meteor Lake (MTL) for inference acceleration. Another interesting confirmation from new Linux driver patches is their media encode/decode moving to a "standalone media" Graphics Technology (GT) block...  ( 5 min )
    Short-Lived ASUS Sensors Linux Driver Being Removed In Favor Of Better Alternative
    Mainlined to the Linux kernel less than one year ago was the "asus_wmi_ec_sensors" for supporting temperature / fan speed / CPU current sensor reading on a variety of newer ASUS motherboards. That driver is now being removed as a superior driver is taking over the ASUS motherboard sensor reading duties...  ( 5 min )
    Canonical Continues Snap'ing Up Linux Gaming For Ubuntu
    In addition to continued improvements to its Steam Snap for running that gaming client within Canonical's sandboxed confines, the latest Linux gaming component to receive similar treatment is now Feral Interactive's GameMode...  ( 4 min )
    Intel's SYCLomatic 20220829 Released For Converting CUDA Code To C++ SYCL
    Back in May Intel announced SYCLomatic as an open-source tool for converting CUDA code to C++ SYCL for execution within their oneAPI stack on Intel GPUs and more. Out today is SYCLomatic 20220829 as their first tagged version of this code porting helper...  ( 4 min )
    Mesa's Zink Adds Async Compute Pipeline Creation
    Valve contractor Mike Blumenkrantz who continues to be focused on the Zink OpenGL-on-Vulkan code tacked on the latest feature for Mesa 22.3...  ( 4 min )
    AMD Announces Ryzen 7000 Series "Zen 4" Desktop CPUs - Linux Benchmarks To Come
    AMD CEO Lisa Su today formally introduced their Ryzen 7000 series desktop processors built atop their Zen 4 architecture.  ( 7 min )
  • Open

    Netflix's Cyberpunk 2077 anime Edgerunners arrives 13th September
    Netflix's animated Cyberpunk 2077 series, Edgerunners, is right around the corner, with the streaming service having now slapped it with a 13th September release date and celebrated the announcement with the launch of a "NSFW" trailer. Announced back in June 2020, Cyberpunk: Edgerunners is a 10-episode collaboration between Cyberpunk 2077 developer CD Projekt and Japanese animation studio Trigger (Little Witch Academia, Kill la Kill) that tells the story of a street kid trying to survive in the technology and body modification obsessed Night City. "Having everything to lose," explains Netflix, "he stays alive by becoming an Edgerunner - a mercenary outlaw also known as a cyberpunk." Read more  ( 15 min )
    Shovel Knight Dig's "ever-changing chasm of mystery" opens in September
    Spade-wielding platform hero Shovel Knight will be embarking on a brand-new adventure on 23rd September, when Shovel Knight Dig launches for Steam, Switch, and Apple Arcade. Shovel Knight Dig, a collaboration between Yacht Club Games and UK studio Nitrome, feels like it's been a long time coming, having first been revealed all the way back in 2019 - when Yacht Club explained it would take players deep into an "ever-changing chasm of mystery". More specifically, it'll pit Shovel Knight against Drill Knight and his digging crew in a quest that'll see adventurers jumping, slashing, and tunnelling their way downward through stages procedurally stitched together from "thousands" of level chunks in a bid to reach the bottom. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Ubisoft's guitar learning subscription service Rocksmith+ out next week on PC
    Rocksmith+, the new subscription service version of Ubisoft's long-running guitar learning series, finally has a release date and is coming to PC next Tuesday, 6th September. Rocksmith+ was, you may recall, originally due to launch last summer, but Ubisoft made the decision to postpone its release based on player feedback during its closed beta, saying it wanted to "ensure we provide the best guitar learning experience [and] deliver a smoother experience for all guitar and bass lovers". Nearly twelve months later, Rocksmith+ is finally ready for release and will launch next week via the Ubisoft Store, promising a range of tools to help players hone their music skills. These include interactive lessons featuring Adaptive Difficulty - said to dynamically adjust to a player's skill level while they play - and the Rocksmith+ Connect app for iOS and Android, which will take care of note detection and real-time feedback without the need for any peripherals. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Paradox's grand strategy society builder Victoria 3 gets October release date
    Victoria 3, the latest entry in Paradox Interactive's long-dormant society builder series, finally has a release date and will be coming to PC and Xbox Game Pass for PC on 25th October. Victoria, if you're unfamiliar (which wouldn't be all that surprising given that the previous game in the series released well over a decade ago), transports players back to the era of the Industrial Revolution for a take on Paradox's beloved grand strategy genre that's a little closer to a management game compared to the, say, RPG leanings of Crusader Kings. Here, the focus is on building up the economic machinery of your state and country at the height of industrialisation - a process primarily achieved by tweaking and tinkering within your own borders, managing your people and fulfilling their needs to address political and societal challenges and deal with diplomacy further afield. Read more  ( 15 min )
    This Joy-Con adapter lets you play Nintendo Switch with one hand
    YouTuber Akaki Kuumeri has created an adapter which lets you to use two Joy-Cons with one hand. Kuumeri documented the design and testing process on YouTube, and also showed how to assemble all the pieces in the final design. This isn't the first adapter Kuumeri has created for controllers. In January, Ed covered the DualSense adapter he designed. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Tom Hanks has a trivia game called Hanx101 and it's an Apple Arcade exclusive
    Hollywood legend Tom Hanks has a video game coming out. Really. Hanx101 is a trivia game due out exclusively on Apple Arcade this Friday, 2nd September. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Games with Gold's Xbox 360 games offering ends with Portal 2 in September
    Microsoft has announced September's Xbox Games with Gold lineup. Excellent dungeon crawler Gods Will Fall is available to download on Xbox One and Xbox Series X and S from 1st to 30th September. "Numinous landscapes and skull-rattling combat combine in this leftfield classic," Donlan wrote in Eurogamer's Gods Will Fall review from 2021. Also on Xbox One and Xbox Series X and S is Double Kick Heroes, a zombie killing combination of shoot 'em-up and rhythm game. That one is available from 16th September to 15th October. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Naughty Dog shows off seven uncut minutes of The Last of Us Part 1
    Naughty Dog has shown off seven uncut minutes of The Last of Us Part 1 ahead of its launch on PlayStation 5 this week. The video, below, shows the Bill's Town section of the game. Joel, Ellie and Bill begin by stealthily taking down enemies before things go downhill. The gameplay ends with a Bloater fight in a gymnasium. This video is one of our best looks yet at the scope of Naughty Dog's high-profile remaster of its 2013 hit PlayStation 3 game. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Spider-Man Remastered mods let you play as Kermit, Saul Goodman, Elsa and more
    Have you ever fancied swinging about New York City as Kermit? Or Elsa? If yes, you're in luck. It's been a hot while since my first mod round-up for Spider-Man Remastered. Since then, more modders have shared their work on Nexus Mods. Here are some more mods which put people who have no business being in Spider-Man into Spider-Man. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Dragon Ball partnership coming to PUBG Mobile next year
    Dragon Ball is coming to PUBG Mobile in 2023, announced soon after the anime arrived in Fortnite. The partnership is to celebrate the global release of new film Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero. It's unclear at present exactly what the collaboration will include, though it's likely to be themed around the film specifically. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Logitech forces leaked images of its upcoming Nintendo Switch-style gaming handheld offline
    The first images of Logitech's upcoming Nintendo Switch-like gaming handheld leaked last night - before getting forced offline. As reported by The Verge, tech writer Evan Blass tweeted a trio of images showing off the device ahead of a planned reveal from Logitech. The images were subsequently pulled offline following intervention from Logitech - but not before the internet noticed. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Immortality review - an ingenious Hollywood mystery made less profound by the invitation to solve it
    There's a theory going that Christopher Nolan is haunted by Stanley Kubrick - haunted but, crucially, not possessed. Nolan's hardly shunned the comparisons (and fair enough - few directors would). He naturally talked about 2001: A Space Odyssey during the promotional rounds for Interstellar, his sci-fi epic about humanity's place in the universe. And about the way Hans Zimmer, his composer, borrowed moments of 2001's Thus Spake Zarathustra and worked that into Interstellar's score. But the reason he's haunted by Kubrick, as opposed to possessed, is that while Nolan's work has always channelled a bit of Kubrick's, it's never truly become it - never quite ascending to that plane. Nolan, since the still extraordinary Memento, has been a director who takes the themes, the scale, the technical marvel of directors like Kubrick and channelled these into making films that are repeatedly, often incomparably impressive. The problem, and the reason why it often feels like he's carrying around this Kubrickian curse, is there is a difference between films that are impressive and films that are profound. The temptation for me here is to look at Immortality, a game of demons, vice, and backwards talking, centred on mystery and murder, and say that just as Nolan is haunted by Kubrick, Sam Barlow, Immortality's director and co-writer, is haunted by David Lynch. Read more  ( 22 min )
    Looks like another new Pokémon will be revealed soon
    It looks like another new Pokémon from the forthcoming Scarlet and Violet is set to be revealed soon. Yesterday a tweet from the official Pokémon account showed "photographs" from a Paldean photographer showing "strange markings". Today it's confirmed these are from a new Pokémon called Grafaiai who's "quite difficult to catch in action". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Grand Theft Auto 5 NaturalVision Evolved mod now available to download
    The NaturalVision Evolved mod for Grand Theft Auto 5 is now available to download. As previously reported, the mod has been in early access since 2020 and makes numerous improvements to the game's visuals. Now it's available to download in full and suggests, perhaps, the potential quality of GTA 6. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Baghdad-set Assassin's Creed game will reportedly be called Mirage
    Rumours suggest that the next Assassin's Creed game will be called Mirage. As previously reported, the project - codenamed Rift - will be set in Baghdad and release next year. Now YouTuber j0nathan has released a new video detailing information on the game that's been corroborated by Bloomberg reporter Jason Schreier. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Big FIFA 23 leak lets some play a month early, check Ultimate Team stats
    Some people appear to have played FIFA 23 a month before its official launch - and Ultimate Team player statistics are now flooding online. FIFA 23 looks like it was playable for a brief period of time today on Xbox consoles after a pre-load went live to those who pre-ordered the Ultimate Edition. The EA Play trial may also have gone live early, allowing players access. FIFA 23 isn't meant to go live until 27th September. Surprisingly, some players were able to play the game, and even access Ultimate Team mode. One Twitch user, called mexico07dan1, even streamed FIFA 23 before suffering an account ban. However, clips of the stream, including the one below, remain online at the time of publication. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Netflix is slowly adding social features to its games service
    Netflix has added a gamertag system to some of its games, with more social features apparently in the pipeline. "Game handles", a unique and public username, were first spotted in the Netflix app by Steve Moser (later reported by Tech Crunch). The launch of this feature happened quietly last month and is currently only available for some of Netflix's games, including Into the Breach, Mahjong Solitaire and Heads Up!. Only letters and numbers can be used in handles, which will be displayed publicly while playing instead of a profile icon and name. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The Louis Theroux Jiggle Jiggle dance is coming to Fortnite
    The Louis Theroux Jiggle Jiggle dance is on its way to Fortnite. The song was released earlier this year by Manchester-based duo Duke & Jones, based on an old rap from the documentary maker. It quickly went viral on TikTok. Now, according to the Fortnite News Twitter account, the dance is heading to the battle royale. Read more  ( 15 min )
    All-women Games Done Quick speedrunning event raises over $135k for Malala Fund
    The all-women speedrunning event Flame Fatales has raised $135,512 for Malala Fund. Part of Games Done Quick, the latest event ran from 21st-27th August and featured runs of Stardew Valley, Ocarina of Time, Elden Ring, and more. Earlier this year, $132,350 was raised by the group for Malala Fund in its Frost Fatales event. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Facebook Gaming app to shut down in October
    The Facebook Gaming app will shut down on iOS and Android from 28th October. After this date, the app will no longer work. The app is used to watch Facebook Gaming livestreams, though these will still be available within the main Facebook app. Read more  ( 15 min )
    PlayStation reassures fans of single-player games as it launches new mobile game studios division
    Sony has moved to reassure fans of its big budget single-player PlayStation games, as it announces a fresh PlayStation Studios Mobile Division. Writing via the PlayStation blog, studios boss Hermen Hulst listed this year's various PS4 and PS5 games - "huge releases including Horizon Forbidden West, Gran Turismo 7, MLB The Show 22, and on November 9th, the highly anticipated God of War: Ragnarök" - as well as PlayStation VR2, to demonstrate its commitment to console gaming. At the same time, Hulst announced Sony was acquiring Savage Game Studios, a mobile game team based in Berlin and Helsinki, and folding it into the new PlayStation Studios Mobile Division, which will "operate independently from our console development and focus on innovative, on-the-go experiences based on new and existing PlayStation IP". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Gungrave Gore seemingly set for day one Xbox Game Pass release
    Gungrave Gore may be a day one Xbox Game Pass release. That's according to an Xbox newsletter seen in Europe and shared across social media. The game is the third in the Gungrave series - the first in 18 years - and is being developed by South Korean studio Iggymob. Read more  ( 15 min )
    It looks like Big Chungus is headed to MultiVersus
    Warner Bros has filed a trademark for Big Chungus for use in video games, causing speculation (and hope!) that the supersized bunny is coming to MultiVersus. The trademark, filed on 26th August with the European Union Intellectual Property Office, also covers a range of other things such as films, clothing, and toys. Whilst Big Chungus is perfect material for a soft toy, it seems more likely that he is being added to MultiVersus, given the game's popularity and broad roster of fighters. For those of you who aren't aware of this absolute unit, let me explain. Read more  ( 15 min )
    New, lighter PS5 model spotted in Australia
    A new, lighter PlayStation 5 model has been spotted in Australia. Japanese retailers are set to get a new PS5 model (CFI-1200) from 15th September, said to have a new chipset with higher availability. However, that new model is already available now in Australia, as spotted by PressStart. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Mafia 3 developer confirms new Mafia development
    In not-all-that-surprising news, Mafia 3 developer Hangar 13 has confirmed work is underway on a new Mafia title. The confirmation came over the weekend from studio general manager Roman Hladík, in an interview celebrating 20 years of the series. It was reported back in May this year that a fresh Mafia game was indeed in development at Hangar 13, and that it would apparently be set before the existing Mafia trilogy. This would place the game back in the prohibition era of the original - or perhaps earlier. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Sonic Frontiers wrestles with taking the series' essence to the Open Zone
    Back in May of 2018, I remember briefly asking Junichi Masuda, then of Pokémon developer Game Freak (and now chief creative officer at the Pokémon Company), whether Pokémon might one day follow the likes of Zelda and Mario into some kind of open-world format. At the time he called it a "possibility," if, and only if, the studio could find the right way to balance the traditional Pokémon staples with the open-world formula that was proving so successful elsewhere. It wasn't until this January, a good four years later (a lifetime in Pokémon development terms), that we saw what that possibility really was in Pokémon Legends Arceus - an open-ish world game that was really more of a series of open areas, linked together but gated according to your progress, and that progress achieved by doing very traditional, classically Pokémon things. Pokémon is of course barely relevant here, but that means of going sort-of-open-world might sound familiar to those with a close eye on Sonic Frontiers. It's another knot in the thread, which we can now rather neatly tie from Breath of the Wild's leap into the fully open world to Sonic, this coming November, doing the same in its own way. People do like to cut that thread, mind - or go further and suggest it doesn't really exist. A common point made is that, while these games like to market themselves in the same way, finishing a trailer with a series mascot channelling a bit of Caspar David Friedrich by looking out imperiously over a green and mountainous world of adventure, that doesn't mean the games are the same, or that one was inspired in an any meaningful way by the other. These games all have fundamentally different systems and different goals, after all, and so Breath of the Wild isn't an influential game; it just had really influential box art. Read more  ( 23 min )
  • Open

    Europeiska Playstation-spelare bättre på platinatroféer än amerikanska
    Skrytstatistik.  ( 6 min )
    Valve antyder kraftfullare Steam Decks framöver
    Produkten ska spänna över "flera generationer".  ( 6 min )
    Victoria 3 släpps i oktober
    Tolv år efter Victoria 2.  ( 6 min )
    FZ Play - Destroy All Humans! 2
    Återsonderingen börjar klockan 20.  ( 6 min )
    Assassin's Creed Mirage, tidigare Rift, påstås vara redo för release till våren
    Stämmer ryktet? Eller är det en hägring?  ( 6 min )
    En lättare Playstation 5-modell har dykt upp i Australien
    Lika stor, men ett halvkilo lättare.  ( 6 min )
    265 000 besökte Gamescom - jätteras från 2019
    108 000 färre besökare än senast.  ( 6 min )
    Streaming-appen Facebook Gaming stängs i oktober
    Twitch blev en för tuff motståndare.  ( 6 min )
    Dead Island 2
    Det har mycket att bevisa, men bara att det existerar är en bragd för Dead Island 2.  ( 9 min )
    Mafia fyller 20 - ges bort gratis på Steam
    Från torsdag - hurra!  ( 6 min )
    World of Anterra beskrivs som "Skyrim med pixelkonst"
    Kickstartern ligger uppe och spelet ser riktigt lovande ut.  ( 6 min )
    Naughty Dog förklarar varför The Last of Us Part I verkligen är en remake
    Färre genvägar, mer "på riktigt".  ( 7 min )
    I dag släpps Battlefield 2042:s andra säsong – spana in nya kartan
    Stranded äger rum vid ett strandat fraktfartyg.  ( 6 min )
    Hangar 13 bekräftar att ett nytt Mafia är under utveckling
    Men fortfarande några år bort.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Grand strategy society simulator Victoria 3 will be released October 25
    Paradox Interactive has provided an October 25 release date for Victoria 3. The deep socio-economic and political simulation game is set during the 19th century, a time of dramatic technological and social upheaval. You will be charged with not only feeding your growing population but also meeting their political demands to increase or maintain power. To that end, you will need to pass laws and social reforms to reflect the wishes of your citizens or try to "impose a brighter future" on a nation that may not appreciate your forward-thinking ways. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Back 4 Blood's Children of the Worm DLC releases today
    Warner Bros. Games and Turtle Rock Studios have released the second expansion to first-person co-op zombie shooter Back 4 Blood. Titled Children of the Worm, the DLC features brand-new story campaign elements thrusting you into a showdown situation with a new adversary known as The Cultists, fighting for the rise of the Ridden. To combat the new threat, the expansion introduces a new playable Cleaner Known as "Prophet" Dan. This self-proclaimed "preacher of the end times" uses his reviving abilities to provide your team a fighting chance. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Rocksmith+ will teach you how to rock come September 6
    Ubisoft has announced a release date for Rocksmith+ along with information on the game's subscription service. This is the sequel to the best-selling Rocksmith that taught over 5 million folks how to play guitar - including yours truly. Announced in June 2021, the music-learning subscription service teaches you how to play acoustic, electric, and bass guitar through various songs. The service will be available for £12.99 for a one-month subscription, £34.99 for a three-month subscription, and £84.99 for a yearly subscription. Read more  ( 16 min )
    What if GTA 6 actually lived up to Take-Two's lofty expectations? Because it just might
    When Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick, who’s well known for making courageous – and often unpopular – statements, claimed earlier this month that GTA 6 would set a new “creative benchmark for all entertainment,” many folks were quick to dismiss such claims as Take-Two and Rockstar Games’ hype machine derailing way too early. But what if he’s right? The thought of Rockstar setting a new bar for interactive entertainment isn’t an alien concept. In fact, we’re still trying to figure out how the hell GTA Online keeps printing money at such an absurd rate in spite of years of complaints about a broken in-game economy and unbalanced updates. And maybe the answer is simply that Rockstar did in 2013 something that other triple-A developers are still struggling to figure out. It hasn’t been an easy evolution, but the UK-headquartered company has always been ahead of the curve. To this day, we’re still talking about GTA 3 like the first proper 3D open-world game (sorry, Daggerfall). That’s canon now. Claude Speed’s hijinks in Liberty City set the stage for arguably the most famous structure used by modern action-adventure games. And while developers all over the world were trying to adjust to such a radical change, 2002 brought forth Vice City, which is a “magical place” for diehard fans – no matter when they first played it. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Double Kick Heroes, Gods Will Fall, Portal 2, and Thrillville are September's Xbox Games With Gold
    Microsoft has announced the September Xbox Games with Gold lineup. The games for September are Gods Will Fall, Double Kick Heroes, Thrillville, and Portal 2. Gods Will Fall will be available September 1-30, and Double Kick Heroes arrives on the service September 16 and leaves October 15. Read more  ( 15 min )
    High on Life is actually funny, and is funniest when it leans into gaming humor – hands-on
    The Gamescom 2022 showing for High On Life, the new Xbox-exclusive shooter from Squanch Games, has received a pretty mixed response online. Some people have found what’s been publicly showcased to be funny, but to others it’s a real nails-on-chalkboard situation. Having played the game at the show I can say one key thing, however: its humor lands a hell of a lot better in-context and in-game. To some extent, the humor is the whole point of this game. Squanch Games is a games studio founded by Justin Roiland, the co-creator of Rick and Morty and the voice behind the show’s titular characters. Roiland is trying to do what he does best, but in games – in-your-face adult humor, but delivered by colorful characters that, at first blush, might seem kid-friendly. They’re not. The response to High on Life over the last week or so is intrinsically linked to these elements of the game. In fact, I’ve seen next to nobody talking about how it appears to play, or its colorful visuals, or the interesting suite of weapon types and abilities. People are more interested in the fact that the weapons talk, and most interested of all in what they’re saying. Read more  ( 19 min )
    New World Brimestone Sands update brings new zone, weapon and more but leaves big requests untouched
    New World is receiving its first major content update with Brimstone Sands, which adds a new Egyptian-themed zone to the land of Aeternum as well as a new weapon and totally revamped new player experience. Set to launch in October following a stint in the Public Test Realm, the Amazon Games MMORPG hopes to lure players both new and old back. The Brimstone Sands zone features Egyptian ruins built to honour god-like ancients present on the island many years ago, as well as Roman legionaries who travelled there to discover a way to revive the Roman Empire to its former glory. You’ll have to fight past them, plus sand demons and a variety of Egyptian foes to get your hands on new loot added in the update. To help you power through all that nastiness, you can use the new Greatsword weapon. This uses both strength and dexterity, meaning it should fit snugly into builds featuring other martial weapons available. The weapon has both an offensive and defensive tree, allowing for both tanking and DPS capabilities. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Next Assassin's Creed game said to be titled Assassins Creed Mirage
    Information regarding the next Assassin's Creed game has surfaced, and the title is reportedly Assassin's Creed Mirage. This is according to YouTuber j0nathan, who revealed various details on the game, including an expected spring 2023 release. Currently in development under the codename Rift, j0nathan confirmed the Baghdad location, and said the timeline is set between 860 and 870. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Aliens: Dark Descent missions can take ‘anywhere between 20 minutes and an hour’
    After the initial showing of Aliens: Dark Descent, you've probably got a lot of questions: is the game a sequel? Is Aliens: Dark Descent multiplayer? Can you play it only in single-player? When is this new Aliens game coming out? Well, after a hands-off session in Gamescom, Germany, we can at least help you out with the answers to a few of these burning questions. First up, Aliens: Dark Descent is single-player only. The title is a squad-based, single-player action game that lands somewhere between Diablo and XCOM – at least to my eye. Playing through an original Alien story (set sometime after Alien 3, we're told), you will command a squad of marines in real-time combat against the Xenomorph threat. You'll need to think about troop placement, the terror levels of your crew, and how long your traps and tools can hold up before needing repairs. The setup is this: there's a prelaunch screen where you'll have an overview of your crew before every deployment, and once you're done, you'll be able to rifle through the various bits of detritus you've found to see if there's anything particularly meaningful that you can salvage. Enter systems like item rarity, equipment slots, and such. But the actual meat of the game – the amount of time you'll be exploring Moon Lethe with your (probably doomed) crew – that's set at about "anywhere 20 minutes and an hour". Read more  ( 16 min )
    Evil West is probably your favourite action game of 2022
    Devil May Cry, Bulletstorm, and God of War walk into a bar. They all sit, have a drink, and chat about revenge (or something). Suddenly, a gravel-voiced cowboy with pissed off eyes and a six-shooter in his hand kicks the saloon doors in. “This is my turf, lads,” he says, sounding like he’s been on 12 packs of cigs a day since he was five years old. “We don’t need Norsemen, space edgelords, or the son of a demon king in the Old West.” And he’s right, you know? If any of these games went to the Western setting, they’d flounder and fail. Their tone just wouldn’t work: Devil May Cry’s trio of main characters most recently took up residence in definitely-not-London, and that modern setting meshed well with the series penchant descent into hell. Bulletstorm needed its uber-capitalist planet colony to contrast the anarchic chaos of its core cast. God of War… well, it’s a couple of millennia too early over at Sony Santa Monica, isn’t it? So there’s a gap in the over-the-top action market in the frontier lands of the American West. And – fresh off the back of the excellent Shadow Warrior 3 and the artful Trek to Yomi – the folks at Flying Wild Hog are focusing on what they know best: fast, hard, bloody action. And it kicks ass (literally, and metaphorically). Read more  ( 17 min )
    The Pokémon World Championships gave Sword/Shield the ending it deserved – and a game-changing look at the future
    After Pokemon Legends Arceus and remakes of Diamond and Pearl, it feels strange that it’s only been three years since Pokemon Sword and Shield released, pre-pandemic, in November 2019. Back then, the only virus sweeping civilisation was the online eruption over the removal of the National Pokédex, or the bizarre concerns about Yamper’s ass wiggle. Despite the cynicism around its release, the first mainline Pokémon RPG on a home console carried expectations of catapulting the franchise’s competitive branch to new heights of popularity. As we’re all aware, that script was flipped in a way nobody anticipated. The Pokémon World Championships, originally scheduled to take place in London in 2020, were delayed two years in a row due to COVID-19, along with the respective tournament circuits. The Pokémon Company offered an admirable online replacement in the Pokémon Players Cup events, while corners of the Video Game Championship (VGC) community staged their own tournaments to fill the void. The changing VGC rulesets and the release of two expansions, Isle of Armor and The Crown Tundra, maintained enthusiasm for Sword and Shield during lockdown. Online tournaments too meant a wider net of players could compete without travel expenses – like other esports during the pandemic. For a game pitched on stadium-sized battles and ballooning Pokémon through Dynamax, however, the big stage and in-person crowds felt like a key ingredient more so than any preceding Pokémon title in fulfilling its potential as a spectator event. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Warner Bros. Discovery and Rocksteady Studios announce an all-new Games Academy in the UK
    Today, Warner Bros. Discovery and Rocksteady Studios have teamed up together to launch an inaugural Games Academy in the UK. This programme is focused on giving under-represented and eager game creators insight into the games industry, and offering formal training to up-and-coming developmental talent. The programme is being launched in partnership with NextGen Skills Academy, who is 'a leader in delivering skills-based vocational training for the creative industries.' Its aim is to help participants to build their confidence and to equip them with up-to-date technical skills that'll aid with their careers in games. Ergo: it'll help make the UK a destination for video game development talent. The programme itself will run for 12 weeks, providing a hybrid training model that teaches participants about art, audio, quality assurance testing, and games design. Up to 20 selected participants will be able to partake in workships led by industry professionals, develop skills using software (such as Jira and Wwise), and use engines like Unreal. Those taking part will receive feedback and guidance on their work directly from the team at Rocksteady – the developer behind the Batman: Arkham Trilogy and the upcoming Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League – too! Read more  ( 17 min )
    'All-new Mafia project' confirmed to be in development
    At long last, it has finally been confirmed that an "all-new" Mafia game is in development. In celebration of the series' 20th anniversary, an in-house interview with Hangar 13 was shared. As of this month, it's been twenty years since the Mafia series made its debut with Mafia: The City of Lost Heaven, and it's certainly come a long way since. In commemoration, general manager Roman Hladík and head of production/media director Tomáš Hřebíček - who have worked on every game in the series - sat down, looked back on Mafia, and shared some dazzling new information with fans. They were also joined by another Hangar 13 game director, Alex Cox, who has been with them since the Mafia 2. Towards the conclusion of the interview, the team were asked what's next for the Mafia franchise, to which Roman Hladík responded, "I'm happy to confirm we've started work on an all-new Mafia project! While it's a few years away and we can't share anything more right now, we're really excited to keep working on this beloved franchise and to entertain our players with new stories." Read more  ( 16 min )
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    Victoria 3 from Paradox Interactive releasing October 25
    Paradox has today confirmed that Victoria 3 will be releasing on October 25, plus it's available for pre-order with a new trailer too.  ( 4 min )
    Steam Deck Verified and Playable hits 5,000
    There it is, the big one! Through the Deck Verified system we now have 5,000+ games listed as either Verified or Playable for the Steam Deck.  ( 4 min )
    AMD announced "Zen 4" with Ryzen 7000 series, RDNA3 teased
    AMD has revealed their next-generation Zen 4 processors with the Ryzen 7000 series that will be launching September 27.  ( 4 min )
    Seems I'll be replaying Half-Life 2 again soon but this time in VR
    Half-Life 2: VR Mod is on the way and will hit official Beta on Steam on September 16th, so I guess I'll be playing it all over again then.  ( 4 min )
    Necrosmith is a budget indie banger
    Necrosmith is a roguelike real-time strategy management game. You create minions and release them to scout your surroundings, defend your castle, gather loot, and destroy enemy lairs.  ( 5 min )
    Kena: Bridge of Spirits gets Steam Deck Verified ahead of the Steam release
    Kena: Bridge of Spirits is a gorgeous looking story-driven, action adventure that was exclusive to the Epic Store but the time is up and it's coming to Steam now. It's also been Steam Deck Verified ahead of release.  ( 4 min )
    Proton Experimental fixes Final Fantasy XIV Online launcher, GTA V texture loading
    Proton Experimental for Steam Deck and Linux desktop from Valve recently had two small updates. Although small, they do have some major fixes.  ( 4 min )
    Wine 7.16 out fixing up Saints Row, Wow64 support in X11 driver
    Slightly later than they usually put up the releases, the Wine team released Wine 7.16 on August 28th bring new features and bug fixes for the Windows translation layer.  ( 4 min )
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    Intel Core 13000 "Raptor Lake" uppges lanseras den 20 oktober
    En läckt lanseringsplan pekar mot ett avtäckande i samband med utrullningen av AMD:s Ryzen 7000-processorer medan butikstillgänglighet sker en knapp månad efter.  ( 5 min )
    Läckta bilder visar Logitechs portabla spelkonsol
    Logitech och Tencent jobbar på en handhållen spelkonsol och via läckta bilder får vi se hur enheten kan komma att se ut.  ( 6 min )
    Logitech G visar upp G502 X-serien
    Ikoniska G502-mössen har fått en ordentlig uppgradering i form av ny design, lättare bygge och nya hybridbrytare.  ( 6 min )
    Snabbkoll: Vad tyckte du om Ryzen 7000-presentationen?
    AMD visade upp första Ryzen 7000-processorerna i natt. Tyckte du presentationen var bra eller anus?  ( 5 min )
    Intel Arc med färska drivrutiner testas i 50 spel – 41 får tummen upp
    PC Games Hardware snurrar igång Intel Arc A380 för att undersöka hur grafikkortet hanterar både nya och gamla spel. För det mesta är resultaten goda.  ( 6 min )
    AMD ger smakprov av RDNA 3
    Efter en rafflande Ryzen 7000-presentation gläntar AMD på dörren till Radeon RX 7000-serien, genom att visa bild och spel.  ( 6 min )
    AMD avtäcker Ryzen 7000 "Raphael" med arkitekturen Zen 4 och sockel AM5
    Den nya processorfamiljen Ryzen 7000 "Raphael" blir AMD:s första på 5 nanometer, vilket sällskapas av en ny sockel, nya finesser och integrerad grafik.  ( 11 min )
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    Jonathan Dowland: Venineth
    My turntable is temporarily out of action so this post is in lieu of a crate digging update. Some time ago, I saw Matt Hoye raving about a little indie game called Venineth. I think he said it was the perfect little game to relax to. I don’t regularly play games but I could sometimes do with some help relaxing. I was reminded about Venineth when I saw some buzz about Exo One, a similar-looking game, so I thought I’d give Venineth a go. A scene near the start of Venineth It’s great fun: Relaxing, mildly challenging, and satisfying. It didn’t run terribly well on my T470s but I’ve since upgraded to a workstation which should handle it easily so I need to try it again. The reason this is a substitute for a crate digging post: although I’ve not picked Venineth back up in a while, I have had the soundtrack on a reasonably heavy rotation. It’s an immersive, synth driven instrumental album by polish musician Echo Ray that is good music to listen to when concentrating.  ( 1 min )
    John Goerzen: The PC & Internet Revolution in Rural America
    Inspired by several others (such as Alex Schroeder’s post and Szczeżuja’s prompt), as well as a desire to get this down for my kids, I figure it’s time to write a bit about living through the PC and Internet revolution where I did: outside a tiny town in rural Kansas. And, as I’ve been back in that same area for the past 15 years, I reflect some on the challenges that continue to play out. Although the stories from the others were primarily about getting online, I want to start by setting some background. Those of you that didn’t grow up in the same era as I did probably never realized that a typical business PC setup might cost $10,000 in today’s dollars, for instance. So let me start with the background. Nothing was easy This story begins in the 1980s. Somewhere around my Kindergarte…
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    Comic for 2022.08.30 - Year 2009
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )
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    Untitled
    No content preview  ( 2 min )
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    7 Best Open Source Library Management Software
    Open source library management software are the best! Let's take a look at some of them here.  ( 25 min )

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    Best Gaming Laptops Under $1,500
    Today, you can find a powerful gaming laptop without breaking the bank. We’ve tested to help you find the best.  ( 69 min )
    Sony Slices Another 300 Grams off the Weight of the PlayStation 5
    The Sony PlayStation 5 CFI-1202A (with ODD) is 300g lighter, and the PlayStation 5 CFI-1202B (digital) is 200g lighter. Sony documentation confirms the changes, but no details about what was cut.  ( 59 min )
    Lightmatter Aims to Bridge Chiplets With Photonics
    As chiplets are increasingly seen as the future of computation, Lightmatter aims to reduce power consumption and latency by interconnecting chips through light rather than wires.  ( 60 min )
    Noctua Releases First Thermal Paste Application Recommendation for Ryzen 7000
    Noctua has released the first thermal paste application recommendation we've seen to date for AMD's upcoming Ryzen 7000 processors.  ( 59 min )
    Nvidia Flip-Flopping Over GeForce RTX 4070 Specs, Says Leaker
    Team Green is allegedly dithering over 7,680 or 7,168 CUDA cores, 12 or 10GB of VRAM, and a 285W or 250W TGP before finalizing the GeForce RTX 4070 specifications.  ( 59 min )
    Intel Prepping DisplayPort Multi-Stream Support for Arc GPUs on Linux
    Intel is adding a bunch of new improvements to an upcoming Linux driver update coming in October, and one of them is DP MSC with DSC support.  ( 59 min )
    U.S. Semiconductor Renaissance: All the Upcoming Fabs
    Intel, GlobalFoundries, Samsung Foundry, TI, and TSMC are building new fabs in the U.S. Here's everything we know about the upcoming facilities.  ( 67 min )
    Viotek GFI24CBA Review: Solid Budget Gaming Monitor
    How much gaming monitor can you get for less than $250? The Viotek GFI24CBA delivers 144 Hz and Adaptive-Sync with an IPS panel at FHD resolution for less than the price of a rock concert ticket.  ( 68 min )
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    Poliovirus outbreak expands in NY: Third county has vaccination rate of 62%
    "One New Yorker paralyzed by polio is already too many," state health commissioner says.  ( 5 min )
    Musk subpoenas Twitter whistleblower, hoping to prove company lied about spam
    The whistleblower complaint might help Twitter's case instead, though.  ( 7 min )
    Trademark filing for “Reality Pro” suggests Apple’s headset is on the way
    Legal firms and shell companies Apple has used in the past were involved.  ( 5 min )
    Sony launches lighter PS5 model for second straight year
    New models are about 13 percent lighter than 2020's hefty launch-era consoles.  ( 6 min )
    Warning sign? NASA never finished a fueling test before today’s SLS launch attempt
    "I am very proud of this launch team."  ( 6 min )
    FTC sues data broker that tracks locations of 125M phones per month
    Agency says data shows users visits to clinics and homeless shelters.  ( 7 min )
    Dish and Viasat’s fight against Starlink satellite deployment fails in court
    Dish interference claim rejected; Viasat environmental protest "too speculative."  ( 6 min )
    Chinese propose to build a dam with a distributed 3D printer
    Engineers want to use robots as a sort of distributed 3D printer.  ( 6 min )
    Zuckerberg avoids Cambridge Analytica deposition as Facebook agrees to settle
    A settlement agreement drafted in the next 60 days will reveal the cost to Meta.  ( 6 min )
    Apple Watch “Pro” rumored to have new bands, price close to $1,000
    Recent leaks conflict with earlier Bloomberg reports on dimensions  ( 5 min )
    Review: Netflix’s exquisite The Sandman is the stuff dreams are made of
    A master class in adapting a beloved graphic novel series.  ( 6 min )
    Honda is the latest automaker looking to build a US battery factory
    Honda and LG Energy Solution have formed a joint venture to make US batteries.  ( 5 min )
    Heat waves + air pollution can be a deadly combination
    Their health risk together is worse than either alone.  ( 5 min )
    TMNT Cowabunga Collection review: A ‘90s dream, a few months too late
    13-game compilation benefits from cool tweaks, rollback netcode.  ( 10 min )
    The final countdown begins for NASA’s hulking new rocket
    "We are prepared for just about anything."  ( 6 min )
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    Source: IBM disguised Watson Health layoffs as a 'redeployment initiative'
    Funnily enough, most of those hit were aged over 40, it is claimed Exclusive  After announcing in January it was selling its Watson Health group to investment firm Francisco Partners, IBM assured staff left behind from the sale that they would be redeployed within Big Blue.…  ( 6 min )
    Microsoft adds virtual core licensing to Windows Server
    Yes, we're totally doing this as a favor for partners and not because we were being sued in Europe Microsoft has announced a major overhaul to its Windows licensing regimes that make it rather easier to use its operating system in the cloud – without mentioning the real reason for the change is to get the European Union off its back.…  ( 6 min )
    Euro watchdogs 'abandon $1b fine' against Qualcomm
    Snapdragon giant was accused of bribing Apple not to use rival modems The European Commission has reportedly called it quits in its bid to fine Qualcomm for alleged anti-competitive payments to Apple.…  ( 5 min )
    Critical hole in Atlassian Bitbucket allows any miscreant to hijack servers
    Grab and deploy this backend update if you offer even repo read access A critical command-injection vulnerability in multiple API endpoints of Atlassian Bitbucket Server and Data Center could allow an unauthorized attacker to remotely execute malware, and view, change, and even delete data stored in repositories.…  ( 5 min )
    LG makes a TV roughly the size of a queen-sized bed
    Claims it has 'the world’s largest' OLED LG Electronics released a TV it is claiming is “the world’s largest” OLED.…  ( 4 min )
    NASA scrubs today's Space Launch System rocket launch
    This science stuff is harder than it looks NASA's Space Launch System remained rooted to the pad this morning at the Kennedy Space Center on the US East Coast after its launch was scrubbed by controllers.…  ( 5 min )
    Waferscale startup says it can stitch chips together with light
    Interconnect tech promises 96TB/s die-to-die communications Hot Chips  As chipmakers look to scale compute to ever-greater heights, they’re increasingly turning to waferscale compute architectures to circumvent bandwidth and latency bottlenecks.…  ( 6 min )
    You can never have too many backups. Also, you can never have too many backups
    A Reg reader comes to appreciate the value of paper Who, Me?  In this modern era when massive amounts of storage can be had for pennies on the gigabyte, it's easy to forget that it was not always thus. Once upon a time, keeping business data safe was a cost- and labor-intensive process.…  ( 5 min )
    Facebook settles Cambridge Analytica class action for undisclosed amount
    Zuckerberg and Sandberg won't have to testify – worth much more than cash for Meta Meta's Platforms has reached an agreement to settle the consumer lawsuits brought as a result of Cambridge Analytica's unauthorized harvesting of user data – an outcome that means Facebook execs won't be required to testify in court.…  ( 5 min )
    Germany orders Sept 1 shutdown of digital ad displays to save gas
    Something to thank Putin for … unless you’re the admin trying to implement buggy and fast-changing rules while avoiding Bork Germany has ordered overnight shutdowns for non-essential digital signage, to save its reserves of natural gas for more important purposes.…  ( 4 min )
    Indian services giants fight over moonlighting employees
    PLUS: Trustwave's Singapore owners selling?; Pakistan's suspiciously political internet brownout; Indonesian data leaks; and more! Asia In Brief  Senior execs at India's big IT outsourcers are debating whether it is appropriate for their staff to take on additional paid work outside the company.…  ( 9 min )
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    Sony i köptagen, förvärvar mobilstudion Savage Game Studios
    Jobbar i detta nu på ett mobilt AAA-spel.  ( 6 min )
    Perspektivet i Resident Evil 4 inte menat att vara revolutionerande
    Shinji Mikamis verk startade dock en våg.  ( 6 min )
    Layers of Fear-trailer ger oss nya perspektiv på föregångarna
    Nya spelet är ett hopkok av de äldre.  ( 6 min )
    Under The Waves
    När en sorgsen man inte längre kan han andas flyr han ner i havsdjupet.  ( 7 min )
    VR-rea hos HTC - flera Vive till lägre pris
    No content preview  ( 6 min )
    Svenska dino-shootern Second Extinction släpps i oktober
    Co-op mot muterade urtidsmonster.  ( 6 min )
    Dual Universe släpps nästa månad, trial-version utlovad
    Rymd-MMO:t färdigt efter åtta års utveckling.  ( 6 min )
    Dome Keeper blandar gruvarbete med kupolförsvar
    En demo finns, men bara i en vecka till.  ( 6 min )
    Efter PS5-prishöjningen: ingen höjning av Switch-priset
    Åtminstone inte för stunden.  ( 6 min )
    GTFO-utvecklarnas nästa titel är ett "heist-spel"
    Som Payday, fast med mindre skjutande och tekno-thriller som tema.  ( 6 min )
    Tio gånger fler lirar nu Total War: Warhammer III
    Tack vare Immortal Empires-betan.  ( 6 min )
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    Here's the first footage of Battlefield 2042's newest map Stranded
    DICE has shown off new gameplay footage of Battlefield 2042's latest map: Stranded. Set in the drained carcass of the Panama Canal, fitting the broader climate-apocalypse theme of the game, Stranded is a small-sized map with a focus on infantry combat. You can read more about the map and my initial impressions here. You can also have look at how Breakthrough and Conquest 64 plays out on the map through gameplay captured during a hands-on session. Read more  ( 15 min )
    HTC Vive headsets go on sale after Meta and PlayStation price hikes
    HTC Vive is running a sale across its VR hardware from 29th August to 11th September. The timing of this couldn't have fallen (or been planned) better on HTC's part. Combined with the current cost of living crisis in the UK and the price hikes of both PlayStation 5 and Meta Quest 2, a discount is sorely welcomed. For UK customers, the full list of discounts includes: Read more  ( 15 min )
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    UEFI 2.10 + ACPI 6.5 Specifications Released With Updates For CXL, LoongArch, RISC-V
    The UEFI Forum has published the UEFI 2.10 and ACPI 6.5 specifications to make these standards more adaptable to IoT platforms and other new device support from the LoongArch processor architecture to CXL memory support...  ( 4 min )
    Intel Sends In More GPU Driver Patches For Linux 6.1: More Arc Graphics, Early MTL
    Following last week's initial batch of Intel i915 GT updates for DRM-Next ahead of Linux 6.1, today a new pull request was issued of drm-intel-next material that is primed for Linux 6.1...  ( 5 min )
    PostgreSQL Optimizes Performance & Lower Memory Management Overhead
    An interesting commit made it into the open-source PostgreSQL database server this morning...  ( 5 min )
    Intel Revises Linux Graphics Driver Support For DP MST Display Stream Compression
    Along with all the other ongoing Linux work for Arc Graphics, another feature patch series from Intel worth mentioning is they have been buttoning up work on DisplayPort Multi-Stream Transport Display Stream Compression (MST DSC) functionality...  ( 5 min )
    AMD Posts Latest VNMI Patches For The Linux Kernel
    Back in early June AMD engineers began posting support for enabling Virtual NMI on Linux for AMD CPUs with KVM and permitting hardware support. VNMI is expected to finally happen on the AMD side with Zen 4 processors and today they posted their latest revision of this work...  ( 5 min )
    Latest Round Of Optimizations Wrap Up For Old ATI R300 To R500 GPUs On Linux
    Last week I wrote about Mesa's R300 Gallium3D driver seeing new optimizations for R300~R500 class GPUs from the ATI days, thanks to the open-source community. Another merge request is now open that finishes up the latest optimization spree for these old pre-AMD GPUs on Linux...  ( 5 min )
    ASpeed DRM Driver Adding DMA-BUF/PRIME Sharing For Use With Servers Having dGPUs
    The ASpeed "AST" DRM driver that is for use with ASpeed BMCs on server platforms for display capabilities is preparing to see DMA-BUF and PRIME sharing support. This is useful so the ASpeed BMC can see the screen contents even if the server is relying on a discrete GPU rather than the baseboard management controller's monitor output...  ( 4 min )
    Linux 6.0-rc3 Released In Marking 31 Years Since Linus Torvalds Announced It
    Linus Torvalds just released the third weekly release candidate of the upcoming Linux 6.0 kernel...  ( 5 min )
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    Netflix throws Resident Evil on the endless pile of shows it's cancelled
    If it's a Netflix show released post-2018 or so, you can probably bet on it being cancelled, and that's just what has happened to Resident Evil. Another day, another headline that reads 'Netflix cancels insert show you probably like here,' this time that particular show being Resident Evil. As reported by Deadline, Netflix has decided against renewing the show for a second season, only a month and a half after it was released on July 14. As noted by Deadline, the show didn't have a particularly strong showing in Netflix's top 10, and points out that Netflix determines if it renews a show based on cost vs. viewing. But as always, how many people actually watched the show is a complete mystery, as Netflix, like essentially all streaming services, don't release viewing numbers at all, not even giving them to showrunners. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Twisted Metal TV show has finished filming, moves on to post-production
    The TV adaptation of Twisted Metal has apparently wrapped up filming, and has moved onto post-production. As spotted by VGC, Twisted Metal's showrunner Michael Johnathon posted a tweet over the weekend noting that season one of the show had finished shooting. The show was greenlit back in 2021, and has writers from the Deadpool films attached as well. "The cast and crew of Twisted Metal was something special," wrote Johnathon in a tweet. "Even with lightning delays, extreme heat, and cars that wouldn’t do as they’re told, everyone worked as hard as they could to make sure Twisted Metal kicked as much as possible. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Splatoon 3 players are getting banned before the game is even out
    Splatoon 3 might not actually be out yet, but people are still already experiencing console and potentially Nintendo Switch Online bans from cheating. In more recent years, Nintendo has been holding online tests for its multiplayer games, and it just did so over the weekend with Splatoon 3, giving everyone a first taste of the revamped Splatfests. The objectively correct Rock won the festivities, but it seems like some players were out for more than just splatting. As reported by Nintendo Life, and as spotted by dataminer OatmealDome, Nintendo has already banned players who are modifying the game. It seems that the main reason players are experiencing bans is that they are accessing areas they aren't meant to be able to yet, such as the testing range, by using patches that have been shared online. OatmealDome noted that players are receiving console bans if they've modified the game, and potentially even complete bans from using Nintendo Switch Online. Read more  ( 15 min )
    PlayStation now has a mobile division, as it acquires Savage Game Studios
    PlayStation seems to be pushing towards the mobile market, as it sets up a dedicated mobile division, and acquires a mobile-focused studio. Earlier today (August 29), PlayStation announced that it is acquiring mobile game developer Savage Game Studios. If you haven't heard of it before, that might be because it hasn't actually released a game yet, though its co-founders do include former Zynga, Rovio, and Insomniac staff, so there's plenty of experience in the industry at the very least. On top of that, PlayStation also announced that Savage Game Studios is joining the newly created PlayStation Studios Mobile Division, as sure a sign as any that the company wants to head into the mobile market. The newly created division "will operate independently from our console development and focus on innovative, on-the-go experiences based on new and existing PlayStation IP," as described on the PlayStation Blog announcement post. Read more  ( 15 min )
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    Följ AMD:s avtäckande av Ryzen 7000 i natt klockan 01:00
    I natt vankas livesänt evenemang när Lisa Su intar scenen för att presentera AMD:s nya processorfamilj Ryzen 7000 med arkitekturen Zen 4.  ( 5 min )
    Duckduckgo öppnar betatest för e-postskydd
    DuckDuckGo låter nu alla som vill vara med och betatesta den integritetsfokuserade sökmotorns epostskydd.  ( 5 min )
    DuckDuckGo öppnar betatest av epostskydd för alla
    DuckDuckGo låter nu alla som vill vara med och betatesta den integritetsfokuserade sökmotorns epostskydd.  ( 5 min )
    Ryzen 9 7950X uppges ha en maximal klockfrekvens på 5,85 GHz
    AMD:s kommande flaggskepp på processorfronten sägs kunna nå klockfrekvenser på upp till 5,85 GHz vid enkeltrådiga laster.  ( 6 min )
    Metas nya VR-headset visas i oktober
    Mark Zuckerberg avslöjar en del av Metas framtidsplaner inom VR och bekräftar att nästa VR-headset visas upp i oktober.  ( 6 min )
    Metas nya VR-headset visas upp i oktober
    Mark Zuckerberg avslöjar en del av Metas framtidsplaner inom VR och bekräftar att nästa VR-headset visas upp i oktober.  ( 5 min )
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    Emmanuel Kasper: Moving blog from blogger.com to wordpress.com
    I switched from blogger.com the Google Blog platform to the hosted wordpress.com of Automaticc, the WordPress blog engine main authors. markdown formatting when writing blog entries, finally ! running on a opensource core, that I can move locally to my own server if I ever want to fiddle with MySQL and PHP. I lose: free CNAME redirect using my own domain name a bit of advertising-free space. The blog at wordpress.com has a prominent header indicating I am using the free plan, but I am OK so far with that. What stays the same: Blogger and WordPress.com offer both tag-based RSS feed exports, so I decided to keep for Debian Planet a feed containing only the posts related to free, libre and opensource software. I was not ready to make the jump to a self hosted static blog generator, as I still wanted to have the possibility to comment, without me having to host the comment subsystem. On the personal side, I also intend to pause twitter activity, as I notice current microblogging platforms tend to mostly contain flame wars, self promotion, or shared links I could find anyway with a good feed reader.  ( 5 min )
    Dirk Eddelbuettel: littler 0.3.16 on CRAN: Package Updates
    The seventeenth release of littler as a CRAN package just landed, following in the now sixteen year history (!!) as a package started by Jeff in 2006, and joined by me a few weeks later. littler is the first command-line interface for R as it predates Rscript. It allows for piping as well for shebang scripting via #!, uses command-line arguments more consistently and still starts faster. It also always loaded the methods package which Rscript only started to do in recent years. littler lives on Linux and Unix, has its difficulties on macOS due to yet-another-braindeadedness there (who ever thought case-insensitive filesystems as a default were a good idea?) and simply does not exist on Windows (yet – the build system could be extended – see RInside for an existence proof, and volunteers ar…  ( 4 min )
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    Comic for 2022.08.29 - iPhone 3GS
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )
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    America Songs
    No content preview  ( 1 min )

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    Andrew Cater: Debian Barbeque, Cambridge 2022
    And here we are: second day of the barbeque in Cambridge. Lots of food - as always - some alcohol, some soft drinks, coffee. Lots of good friends, and banter and good natured argument. For a couple of folk, it's their first time here - but most people have known each other for years. Lots of reminiscing, some crochet from two of us. Multiple technical discussions weaving and overlapping Not just meat and vegetarian options for food: a fresh loaf, gingerbread of various sorts, fresh Belgian-style waffles. I''m in the front room: four of us silently on laptops, one on a phone. Sounds of a loud game of Mao from the garden - all very normal for this time of year. Thanks to Jo and Steve, to all the cooks and folk sorting things out. One more night and I'll have done my first full BBQ here. Diet and slimming - what diet?  ( 5 min )
    Steinar H. Gunderson: AV1 live streaming: Muxing and streaming
    Following up on my previous posts, I've finally gotten to the part of the actual streaming (which includes muxing). It's not super-broad over all possible clients, but it probably gives enough information to tell roughly where we are. First, the bad news: There is no iOS support for AV1. People had high hopes after it turned out the latest iOS 16 betas support AVIF, and even embedded a copy of dav1d to do so, but according to my own testing, this doesn't extend to video at all. Not as standalone files, not as . (I don't know about Safari on macOS; I haven't tested.) With that out the way, let's test the different muxes: WebM, continuous file: Given the close historical ties between VP8/VP9 and AV1, one would suppose WebM/Matroska would be the best-working mux for AV1. Surprisingl…  ( 3 min )
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    Nyhetsquiz vecka 34 2022: Skärmnyheter, konsolpriser och fabriksbesök
    Det börjar koka i nyhetsflödet, där allt från skärmar och grafikkort till spelkonsoler och IT-angrepp trängs. Får du full pott den här veckan?  ( 5 min )
    Tio somriga bilder kammar hem Samsungs fototävling
    Nu är årets upplaga av Samsungs fototävling till ända. SweClockers medlemmar har röstat fram segrarna.  ( 6 min )
    Korta reklampauser och halverat pris uppges gälla Netflix reklamabonnemang
    Bloomberg rapporterar om Netflix reklamfinansierade abonnemang. Runt fyra minuter reklam per timme, och en avgift som halverar den populära "Standard"-nivån nämns.  ( 6 min )
    Söndagsmatiné: Erfarenheter från ett halvår med en dum mobiltelefon
    SMS, samtal och en enkel kamera – innan de smarta telefonerna fick fotfäste var det detta som rymdes i en telefon. Hur fungerar det att gå tillbaka till den tiden?  ( 5 min )
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    AMD's Ryzen 9 7950X Zen 4 CPU Reportedly Peaks At 5.85 GHz
    New rumors claim that the next-generation Ryzen 9 7950X 16-core Zen 4 processor can boost up to 5.85 GHz.  ( 59 min )
    Raspberry Pi Generates QR Codes to Unlock Gates and Doors
    This Raspberry Pi project generates a custom QR code that it can email to users to gain access to a gate or door.  ( 59 min )
    Cougar Forza 85 Review: Quiet, Capable Cat
    The Forza 85 is an extremely quiet air cooler that pairs well with Alder Lake CPUs, provided there are reasonable power limits in place.  ( 65 min )
    How to Keep Your CPU Running Cool in Windows
    A little preventative action can keep your PC running cool and smooth.  ( 61 min )
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    Valve's testing an all-new Steam Mobile app
    Valve has commenced rolling out a new version of its Steam Mobile app. Not everyone will be able to give it a try just yet, though, as right now it's only available as part of "a limited beta". Valve said it's holding off from a public release in order to ensure the app works on "so many different phones and devices". "We’ve rebuilt the app on a new framework and modernized the design," Valve said in a brief blog post on the website, before cheekily adding: "(2015 called and wanted their app back). Read more  ( 15 min )
    Diablo Immortal is redesigning its legendary crests to help players "differentiate" between them
    Blizzard is redesigning Diablo Immortal's legendary crests to "help differentiate" them from the eternal legendary chests that cost players real money. Responding to a post in the game's subreddit, lead designer Wyatt Cheng said that the team not only wanted to ensure the colours were different, but also change their shape, too, so "players know exactly what they're getting when they make a purchase". "This is artwork that we're working on to help differentiate the Legendary Crest (which will become [the] Orange one) from the Eternal Legendary Crest (which will remain the purple one in the middle, that yields gems that can be sold on the Market)," Cheng explained. Read more  ( 16 min )
    There are no plans to bring couch co-op to MultiVersus just yet
    There are no plans to introduce co-op to Multiversus just yet. That's according to game director Tony Huynh, who - whilst responding to a question posed by a player on Twitter - said that as the team's current focus is "stabilising [MultiVersus'] experience", any plans to integrate couch co-op is "further out". Huynh added that right now, "netcode improvements, hurt/hitboxes, projectiles, platform interactions" are most important to the team (thanks, NME). Read more  ( 15 min )
    An "Xbox Game Pass: Friends and Family" logo has popped up online
    A logo that says "Xbox Game Pass: Friends and Family" has popped up online. Reportedly taken from Xbox's own backend system, it comes just weeks after Microsoft revealed that it was trialling an Xbox Game Pass tier that would permit players to share their Game Pass subscription with friends and family members. Called Xbox Game Pass Insider Preview, the service allows users - currently restricted to Ireland and Colombia - to "add up to four people to [their] subscription, all with their own unique access to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate games, content, and benefits" (thanks, VGC). The newly discovered logo has yet to be formally shared with the public. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Sonic Frontiers' file size is almost twice as big as Sonic Forces on Switch
    Sonic Frontiers will weigh in at 10.4GB on Nintendo Switch. That makes it bulkier than prior Blue Blur games on Switch - as our friends at Nintendo Life point out, Sonic Forces was 6.6GB, and Sonic Colors: Ultimate was 6.8GB - and gives us a hint at how much bigger the latest instalment, set to be an open-world of course, will be. As for what the game entails? The official store description says: "In search of the missing Chaos emeralds, Sonic becomes stranded on an ancient island teeming with unusual creatures. Battle hordes of powerful enemies as you explore a breathtaking world of action, adventure, and mystery. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Twisted Metal TV show wraps filming and moves into post-production
    Filming has now wrapped on the Twisted Metal TV show. Set to star Will Arnett, Anthony Mackie, and Samoa Joe, the crew working on the live-action television series adapting destruction racer Twisted Metal had a wrap party over the weekend. "That’s a wrap on season one!" tweeted showrunner Michael Jonathan, who also wrote the fan-favourite Netflix show, Cobra Kai (via VGC). Read more  ( 15 min )
    Splatoon 3 cheaters are reportedly getting console and Nintendo Switch Online bans
    Players are already trying to cheat in Splatoon 3, and Nintendo's already banning them. As spotted by Nintendo dataminer OatmealDome, Nintendo is reportedly cracking down on players who are modifying the game, including a patch that let players prematurely enter the testing range. Affected players are getting console bans and "possibly" total bans from subscription service Nintendo Switch Online, too, without which players cannot access multiplayer features. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Inside Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered on PC - the Nixxes tech interview
    One of the biggest releases of the summer, Sony continues to release PC ports of its enviable back-catalogue of first-party PlayStation titles. After shaky beginnings with Horizon Zero Dawn, these PC conversions have gone from strength to strength - and we were very impressed with the conversions of Days Gone and God of War. Just over a year ago, Sony acquired Dutch developer Nixxes - a studio that has previously delivered excellent PC ports of console titles - and with the team having already helped in improving the Horizon port, it has now delivered its first full project for PlayStation: Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered. We've already covered the quality of the conversion elsewhere on Digital Foundry and we've also assessed how the same code runs on both Valve's Steam Deck and the cute AyaNeo Air - and crucial to our work was the assistance of Nixxes itself, who made four key staff members available to us during the review period for this discussion - as well as continuing dialogue and taking on our feedback the more time we spent with the game. This interview is quite lengthy and took considerable time to transcribe but it offers a unique insight into the developmental process of this port from beginning to end, the choice of rendering API, the implementation of key PC enhancements including ultrawide support, plus how and why Nixxes boosted the fidelity of the game's already impressive hardware-accelerated ray tracing. Read more  ( 36 min )
    Games are starting to understand there's more to wildlife than hunting
    Arthur Morgan sets off on a hunting expedition along the banks of the Upper Montana River to gather the provisions needed to feed the whole Van Der Linde gang. He spots the perfect prey: a whitetail deer, with its head down drinking water from the river’s edge. He unsaddles from his trusty horse, equipping his bow and grabbing several arrows upon landing. He initiates hunting mode, stealthily stalking his prey from downwind, until he reaches optimal distance, slipping into cover behind a tree. Arthur carefully draws an arrow from his quiver, notching it to his bow and slowly applying tension to the bow string. He focuses on making a clean kill, nailing the heart of the whitetail deer. He releases his bow string. The arrow whistles through the air. Suddenly something startles the deer, causing the arrow to miss the heart, instead plunging into the lungs. We hear the pained heart-wrenching grunts of the wounded deer. Arthur trudges over, unsheathing his knife. He compassionately puts the animal out of its misery. The Van Der Linde gang will be well fed for a few days. However, as a player, this hunting activity made me re-evaluate my views on the relationship between video games and the wild. Even as a child, I've always had an affinity with animals and nature. A lot of this came from learning about dinosaurs. Who wouldn't be astonished to know that gigantic reptiles roamed the Earth millions of years ago? I've always known that animals are integral to the world and need to be protected. Read more  ( 18 min )
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    Leaked Xbox Game Pass branding suggests family plan can be shared with friends too
    Xbox has recently been trialling letting subscribers share Game Pass with family members, but a recent leak suggests you'll be able to do it with friends too. Earlier this month, Microsoft started testing a family plan of Game Pass in Colombia and Ireland, which lets you share Game Pass benefits with your family. However, as reported by The Verge, some branding for the scheme has leaked which suggests that the plan won't just be limited to family members, but to friends too. As shared by leaker Aggiornamenti Lumia, shared the branding, quite simply called "Friends & Family," which strongly suggests the branding will be more broad than just family members whenever it does launch. It would make things easier, as registering your friends as family members could possibly cause problems somewhere down the line. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Nintendo gives us a nice long look at Stardew Valley meets Final Fantasy game Harvestella
    Square Enix's upcoming farming-sim X action game Harvestella was shown off in the latest Nintendo: Treehouse Live. If you're part of the venn diagram of fans that sits in between Stardew Valley and Final Fantasy, Harvestella will likely be for you. And thanks to Nintendo, we've been given a nice long look at the game. Unsurprisingly, the game starts with the player character experiencing a bout of amnesia, as any good game does, throwing you into a world where the seasons are dictated by four huge crystals, which sounds like the usual kind of Final Fantasy affair. Except uh oh! The fifth season, Quietus, or the season of death, is starting to spread throughout the world, leaving crops withered and dead. As the Treehouse Live quite rapidly explains, another big crystal drops from the sky, which is accompanied by an armoured fellow that the cast aren't quite sure what to do with. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Cult-classics Wild Arms' and Shadow Hearts' directors join forces for double Kickstarter
    The creators of cult-classic JRPGs Wild Arms and Shadow Hearts are joining forces for a double Kickstarter with two spiritual successors to the original titles. Earlier this week, the creators of the two JRPGs announced a supposed first for Kickstarter, a double Kickstarter, for two games; Armed Fantasia, a spiritual successor to Wild Arms, and Pennyblood, in turn a spiritual successor to Shadow Hearts. The campaign opens up tomorrow, August 29, and seeks to raise $750,000. Armed Fantasia is being developed by Wild Bunch Productions, and as reported by RPG Site, consists of numerous members of key staff that worked on the Wild Arms series. The game features "a dramatic story about a group of Pathfinders and their trusted ARMs who embark on a perilous journey across an expansive Westernpunk world hurtling towards destruction." Read more  ( 15 min )
    Shadow of the Tomb Raider is free next week on the Epic Games Store
    If you were thinking about buying Shadow of the Tomb Raider any time soon, don't, because it's free on the Epic Games Store next week. The most recent and probable final entry in the Square Enix published, Eidos-Montreal developed reboot of the series is the next free title to be given away on the Epic Games Store. You'll be able to pick up the game next Thursday, September 1, and you'll have until September 8 to do so. Shadow of the Tomb Raider isn't the only game being made available for free. Submerged: Hidden Depths will also be free for the same period of time. In Submerged, you'll explore a drowned city with deserted villages inhabited by "enigmatic creatures." There's no combat to be found though, self-described as a third-person "relaxploration" adventure. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Atomic Heart's combat trailer looks a little Fallout, a little BioShock
    Atomic Heart, the first-person-shooter set in an alternate 1950s Soviet Union, received a new combat trailer at Gamescom to show you what you'll be in for. The latest trailer for Atomic Heart shows off some gameplay that looks a little bit Fallout, a little bit Dishonored, and a little bit BioShock, combining to form something that seems like you'll have a lot of options, at least when it comes to shooting at and destroying various types of robots. Gameplay, like many games before it, predominantly consists of shooting at things with a number of guns at your disposal, though sometimes you get to swing a melee weapon and slice robots in half too. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Microsoft wants Activision because of mobile gaming opportunities, says Phil Spencer
    Xbox boss Phil Spencer recently touched on the reasoning behind the Activision Blizzard acquisition, noting that the mobile market is a big part of why the move took place. The year obviously started with a bang when Microsoft announced it planned to acquire Activision Blizzard, but the reasoning behind it, aside from more money in the long term, wasn't completely clear. But speaking to Bloomberg, Spencer has shed some light, and it seems that having more games on mobile, and a bit more on PC, was the main driving force behind the acquisition. "The biggest gaming platform on the planet is mobile phones," said Spencer. "One and a half billion people play on mobile phones. And I guess, regretfully as Microsoft, it's not a place where we have a native platform. As gaming, coming from console and PC, we don't have a lot of creative capability that has built hit mobile games." Read more  ( 15 min )
    Nintendo reaffirms it has no plans to increase Switch cost following PS5 price hike
    After Sony recently announced it is raising the price of the PS5, Nintendo has reaffirmed that it has no plans to do the same with the Switch. Earlier this week, Sony announced the PS5 is getting more expensive pretty much everywhere in the world bar the US, going up by £30 in the UK. In response to that, Microsoft confirmed it wouldn't raise the price of the Xbox Series X or S. Now, in a statement to Eurogamer, Nintendo confirmed that it too has "no plans" to increase the cost of the Switch. The statement reaffirmed comments made by Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa in June at the 82nd annual general meeting of shareholders, saying ""'While we cannot comment on pricing strategies, we currently do not have any plans to change the price of our hardware due to inflation or increased procurement costs in each country. We will determine our future pricing strategies through careful and continued deliberations.'" Read more  ( 15 min )
    Knockout City goes semi-aquatic as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles join in Season 7
    The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are coming to the dodgeball-chucking multiplayer arena game Knockout City next week. Season 7 of Knockout City has been revealed, Mutant Mutiny, bringing some new brawlers to the game - the mutants. "Honing their skills in the darkness of the sewers below, The Mutants aren’t just incredible brawlers – they’re a tight-knit Crew built on trust, respect, and camaraderie," writes the blog post announcing their arrival. Of course, the most eye-catching addition to this season are the turtles in a half shell themselves, a description that's still a bit confusing, The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Once season 7 launches August 30, so in just a couple of days time, you'll be able to buy a bundle with all four turtles - Leonardo, Raphael, Michelangelo, and Donatello - and play as them in any dodgebrawl match. Read more  ( 15 min )
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    System Shocks framtid är helt upp till Tencent
    Det är upp till Tencent om vi får en uppföljare till System Shock  ( 6 min )
    Relic visar upp en ny trailer för Company of Heroes 3
    Relic Entertainment flexar RTS-musklerna med en ny trailer.  ( 6 min )
    Nilla Hansson tar oss med bakom kulisserna på Horizon Forbidden West
    Ms.Hansson berättar om motioncapture-arbetet i Aloys senaste äventyr.  ( 6 min )
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    Wine 7.16 Released With WoW64 X11 Driver Support, 20 Bug Fixes
    Wine 7.16 fell slightly off its Friday bi-weekly release train and arrived this morning...  ( 4 min )
    Intel Arc Graphics A380: Compelling For Open-Source Enthusiasts & Developers At ~$139
    Last week I outlined getting Intel Arc Graphics running on a open-source Linux graphics driver when using Linux 6.0 and later (along with a currently-experimental module option override) and then Mesa 22.2+. Now that I've had more days with the Intel Arc Graphics A380 as the company's budget discrete GPU, here are more of my thoughts on this graphics card that has begun retailing in the US for $139.  ( 6 min )
    Ubuntu Isn't Yet Onboard With GNOME's "Device Security" Screen
    Coming with GNOME 43 is a "Device Security" panel within the GNOME Control Center. While intended to help ensure their system is protected, Ubuntu isn't onboard with this Device Security functionality yet and has stripped it out from their GNOME build for Ubuntu 22.10...  ( 5 min )
    Ubuntu 22.10 To Ship With WebP Image Support Out-Of-The-Box
    Prior to this past week's Ubuntu 22.10 feature freeze, webp-pixbuf-loader was promoted to the main archive for allowing WebP images to have thumbnail support within the GNOME desktop on this next Ubuntu release and being able to open up WebP image files within the GNOME image viewer and the like...  ( 4 min )
    AMD Radeon Linux OpenGL Driver Makes More Optimizations, Eyes GL Threading By Default
    Longtime AMD open-source Linux graphics developer Marek Olšák is at it again with some interesting optimizations for RadeonSI Gallium3D and is eyeing at enabling OpenGL threading by default...  ( 5 min )
    Linux 6.1 HID Changes Accumulating: More Tablets, Intel Meteor Lake ISH Support
    A number of noteworthy changes have begun queuing for the Human Interface Devices (HID) subsystem ahead of the Linux 6.1 merge window opening up in just over one month...  ( 5 min )
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    Record label drops AI rapper after backlash over stereotypes
    Plus: Changing call center workers' voices, why we need to do more to get women in ML, and more In brief  A record label this week dropped an AI rapper after the biz was slammed for profiting from the virtual artist, said to be modeled on Black stereotypes.…  ( 7 min )
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    7 Minimalist Linux Distributions Featuring Openbox
    Openbox is a lightweight, configurable, stacking window manager. Here are a few distros that provide Openbox preconfigured.  ( 24 min )
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    Comic for 2022.08.28 - 2009 Chris Brown
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )
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    Former Payday developers are working on a new co-op heist shooter
    The second project from 10 Chambers, the developers of co-op horror shooter GTFO, will be a co-op heist shooter. Creative director Ulf Andersson shared the news at Gamescom, saying that making a game in the genre "feels like it’s an unclosed chapter". Andersson previously worked on Payday 1 and 2 at Overkill Software, before leaving to found 10 Chambers. Read more  ( 16 min )

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    Create your own Disney avatar in Dreamlight Valley's free character creator
    Disney Dreamlight Valley pitches itself as a "life-sim adventure game", in which you can return a cursed land to health while hanging out with characters from across the Disney pantheon. I'm skeptical of it in several different ways, but there's now a free character creator to download and try ahead of its launch next month, and hey, I had fun with it. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Total War's developers are making a third-person melee action game
    Creative Assembly have a mixed history when it comes to games that don't have "Total War" in the title, but that's not stopping them from trying. The studio announced today that alongside future Total War games, the recently announced Hyenas, and another unannounced project, they also have a fourth game now in development. It's an action game and they're recruiting staff "with experience working on third-person titles using the Unreal 5 engine." Read more  ( 16 min )
    Netflix cancel Resident Evil live action series after one season
    Netflix have announced that they're not ordering a second season of their live action Resident Evil adaptation. As reported by Deadline, the critically maligned series failed to find much of an audience since being released on July 14th. Read more  ( 16 min )
    What are we all playing this bank holiday weekend?
    Hallo! Monday is a bank holiday for us here in the UK, so we'll leave you with Alice Bee until the rest of us return on Tuesday (well, aside from those of us taking more time). This is the last big holiday weekend of summer, a traditional time to get out in the countryside or down to the seaside. Could use a little heat and joy with the terrible, terrible winter to come. Anyway! What are you playing this weekend? Here's what we're clicking on! Read more  ( 17 min )
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    30TB Portable SSD Hits Walmart For $39 But Stay Away From It
    Twitter user Ray Redacted unmasks a mysterious 30TB portable SSD that sells for $39 at Walmart.  ( 59 min )
    Intel's Arc A380 Shows Good Compatibility Across 50 Games
    The German publication PC Games Hardware tests Intel's Arc A380 graphics card across 50 titles between 1999 and 2022.  ( 59 min )
    Asus ProArt B660-Creator D4 Review: Pros on a Budget
    Asus’ B660-Creator is an inexpensive ATX option for creative professionals. For under $200 you get three M.2 sockets, a Thunderbolt header, USB Type-C DisplayPort and a black-and-gold RGB-free appearance.  ( 66 min )
    How to Keep Windows Running Smoothly
    A smooth running system will bring months of productivity / entertainment. Keep your rig running smooth with just a little work.  ( 60 min )
    Pinecil V2 Review: Smart Soldering Iron, Powered by RISC-V CPU
    Pine64’s latest RISC-V soldering iron comes in at a low price point, but with features commonly found on more expensive irons.  ( 68 min )
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    The weekend’s best deals: Apple iPad, MacBook Pro, OLED TVs, and more
    Dealmaster also has HyperX gaming headsets, the Google Chromecast, and the Xbox Series S.  ( 9 min )
    Review: HP’s 13.5-inch Spectre x360 is a top ultralight—with flair
    Not the top performer, but the Spectre has other wins, like its 3:2 screen.  ( 5 min )
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    GIMP 2.99.12 Released - "A Huge Milestone Towards GIMP 3.0"
    GIMP 2.99.12 is out as a weekend surprise as the newest development release towards the GIMP 3.0 image manipulation program's release...  ( 4 min )
    Debian Begins A General Resolution To Decide What To Do With Non-Free Firmware
    Debian has begun a general resolution process to solicit a vote by its stakeholders what to do with non-free firmware...  ( 5 min )
    AMD Zen 4 LbrExtV2 Feature Queued Ahead Of Linux 6.1
    Earlier this month AMD posted Linux kernel patches preparing LbrExtV2 as updated Last Branch Record functionality being introduced with upcoming AMD Zen 4 processors. That LbrExtV2 support for the Linux kernel's "perf" subsystem has now been queued up in its respective branch ahead of the Linux 6.1 feature merge window beginning in early October...  ( 5 min )
    Ubuntu 22.10 Optimizing OpenSSH Server Memory Use, Other RAM Optimizations Coming
    As part of a broader effort to reduce system memory use on Ubuntu Linux particularly for server and container/cloud use-cases, Ubuntu 22.10's OpenSSH server has switched to using socket-based activation...  ( 5 min )
    AMD Ryzen Threadripper 5965WX Cooling With The Dynatron A39 Heatsink
    One of the questions that has come up following my AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO 5965WX Linux testing has been how well air-cooling is working out for the 280 Watt workstation CPU. Water cooling is, of course, most ideal but there are air coolers that can work out sufficiently too. Here are some quick reference results...  ( 5 min )
    GCC 13 Seeing Work On OpenMP 5.0 Reverse Offload Functionality
    With the OpenMP 5.0 parallel programming specification there is the reverse offload capability for going from the offloaded device back to the system host. The GCC 13 open-source compiler is seeing work recently around supporting this functionality...  ( 5 min )
    KDE Makes It Easy To Now Remap Extra Mouse Buttons, Discover Keeps Getting Better
    KDE developer Nate Graham is out early with his usual weekly development summary that highlights all of this prominent open-source desktop environment. Notable this week is KDE integrating support for re-binding extra mouse buttons as well as a lot of continued work on Discover...  ( 5 min )
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    Nightdive Studios says the fate of a third System Shock game lies in Tencent's hands
    Nightdive Studios has confirmed that the fate of the third instalment of the eagerly-anticipated System Shock series still lies with Tencent. In an interview at Gamescom, CEO Stephen Kick confirmed that whilst his studio retains the right to remake the first - and potentially second - game from the series, rights to the third game were sold to Tencent. "When we originally acquired the rights to the franchise, we licensed the rights for the third game to Warren and Paul [Neurath] at Otherside. They then subsequently sold their rights to Tencent," he told VGC. Read more  ( 16 min )
    GTFO developer 10 Chambers has a co-op heist FPS in "pre-production"
    GTFO developer 10 Chambers has confirmed its next game will be a "techno-thriller" co-op heist shooter that "just has to be made". In an interview with NME at Gamescom, 10 Chambers' creative director and CEO Ulf Andersson said that after working on Payday and Payday 2 before leaving for make GTFO with 10 Chambers, he still yearns to work on another heist game, saying "it feels like an unclosed chapter". "So for me, this game is a game that just has to be made," Andersson said. "I’m back on the heist shit, basically – so it’s a heist cooperative FPS, and it has a sort of a techno-thriller theme. I read a lot of sci-fi books, and so imagine everything that cyberpunk is inspired by, and a ton of other shit. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Voxel Doom brings 3D enemies to the classic id shooter - and it's brilliant
    After 28 years, id Software's classic Doom has finally been voxelised, its 2D sprite graphics given an extra dimension in space thanks to modder Daniel Peterson - aka Cheelio - providing us with another excellent excuse to revisit one of the greatest titles in gaming history. In recent times, various source ports have become the method of choice in playing the game on modern hardware and one of the key features over and above the visual overhaul is the inclusion of mouse look. Original Doom was a 3D game effectively playing out on a 2D plane with no ability to look up or down. If you are shooting enemies that are elevated above, you have a hard time seeing them and the game just chooses to automatically aim vertically for you. This can be a bit frustrating to someone with modern sensibilities for first person games but it can also be annoying as Doom's auto-aim often had strange ideas on what it is you're actually looking to shoot. So this new voxelised mod not only looks to add a welcome 3D look to the 2D sprites, it also helps to make the more modern 'mouse look' enabled version of the game even better. If you're looking up at an enemy you're about to shoot, you'll get a perspective-correct rendition of the enemy in front of you. On top of that, the overall sense of 'believability' is enhanced as circling enemies or objects doesn't give the same flat view any more as the sprites are given 3D dimensions. This applies to all camera-facing sprites from the original game so health packs no longer just rotate to face the camera, but instead have tops, bottoms, sides and more that such a box should have in 3D space. Enemy sprites? Those required a bit more work. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Terror Zones are coming to Diablo 2: Resurrected
    Diablo 2: Resurrected has launched a public test realm for the upcoming 2.5 patch that boasts an all-new "experimental" feature: Terror Zones. As well as a "variety of bug fixes to address feedback the community has provided" Blizzard, Terror Zones see you take up monsters at least two levels higher than you (or their original level) for extra XP and loot in the hope we'll stop "repeatedly farming" Baal, Diablo, or Nihlathak. "The journey to level 99 is a celebrated experience for players and quite the milestone if achieved - a rite of passage, even," Blizzard explains in the patch notes. "We want to offer an alternative to repeatedly farming Baal, Diablo, or Nihlathak. We also want the journey to level 99 to be accessible to a larger population of players, full of variety, and most importantly, challenging - this is where Terror Zones come in. As we get into details, please note that players can choose to opt-out of Terror Zones if desired. Read more  ( 16 min )
    NBA 2K23 has "all-new ways to play in MyTEAM"
    NBA 2K23 has "all-new ways to play in MyTEAM", including Triple threat Online: Co-op and Clutch Time single player, as well as the ability to remove contracts. 2K also confirmed that the annual $250,000 MyTEAM Unlimited tournament is back this year, too, with two tracks: one for last-gen consoles, and another for PS5 and Xbox Series X/S consoles. Triple Threat Online: Co-op - a new mode to MyTEAM - allows players to partner with friends for 3v3 co-op "across different variations" of gameplay. There's also Unlimited, which allows players that reach the top tier to start over and unlock "even more rewards" via Season Points, and Clutch Time Single Player enables you to "jump into a single player version of Clutch Time, a fast-paced mode with a 4-point line, to take your best starting five and compete against the AI". Read more  ( 16 min )
    Indie mining game Dome Keeper gets a September release date
    Indie mining action game Dome Keeper will release on 27th September. In anticipation of the full release - which will be coming to Steam - developer Bippinbits will be taking down its free playable demo on 5th September, so don't hang about if you've been meaning to try it. Dome Keeper - once known as Dome Romantik - boasts "beautiful updated pixel art, atmospheric music and sound" and sees you defend your dome from wave after wave of hostile attacks in this roguelike survival miner. Inbetween attacks, you need to dig beneath the surface in search of valuable resources which can be used to make upgrades to help you stay alive and "make it to the next world". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Netflix's new Resident Evil show has already been cancelled
    In news that's unlikely to surprise you, Netflix has cancelled its Resident Evil series after just a single season. The show - which stars Ella Balinska, Tamara Smart, and Lance Reddick - only debuted on 14th July, but Deadline reports that "as the drama did not have a particularly strong showing on Netflix's Top 10 and cost vs. viewing is the streamer's leading renewal criterion", Netflix has declined to order a second series. On Rotten Tomatoes, the show is currently sitting at 55 per cent for critics, with an audience score of 27 per cent. On Metacritic, it's even worse, boasting a critic score of 53 and a user score of 1.5. Ouch. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Happiness is a Game Boy
    Life is full of little rituals, and little rituals are also a huge part of the appeal of games. Build orders, sending loot off on your pet, typing out a cheery GG. But the best rituals go beyond any individual games. They exist, as platform holders might say, at the hardware level. Here's a favourite. I find a spot in the park. I check for the position of the sun. I arrange bag and book and Tesco Meal Deal, lie back and then fiddle with the screen of the tiny device I'm holding just so, until it catches the light and comes to life. For a while this year, this was a ritual I performed while sitting in the park with a Playdate. But the ritual was slightly complicated, because it harkened back to the real deal, which for me was arranging the reflective screen of the Game Boy Advance when sat by the sash window in my old bedsit. A few weeks ago, I wanted to go past even that former ritual. I wanted to go to the source, to the land before the GBA. I dug out the silver Game Boy Pocket I bought on eBay a while back - boxed! - and then filed somewhere on a bookshelf. I found the 4 double-As I assumed I'd need and then found the two triple-As I actually needed, jammed in Tetris, and headed to the park. Read more  ( 19 min )
  • Open

    Total War-utvecklarna jobbar på ett nytt actionspel
    Skrivbordsgeneralerna Creative Assembly satsar på action.  ( 6 min )
    FZ Play - Världen startar om i My Time at Sandrock
    Efter regn kommer solsken!  ( 5 min )
    Netflix Resident Evil-serie läggs ned efter en säsong
    Inga döda återupplivas för en andra säsong.  ( 6 min )
    Pac-Man World OmPACeteras – Se trailern här
    3D Pac-Man paketeras om för nya generationer.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Nvidia: "Marknaden i balans till årsskiftet"
    VD Jensen Huang berättar mer om hur Nvidia agerar för att tackla överlager och övergången till en ny generations grafikkort.  ( 7 min )
    Intel Core i5-13400 uppges öka kärnantalet
    En kombination av test och rykten målar upp en bild av de mer plånboksvänliga kommande Intel-processorerna, där tillägg av effektiva kärnor kantas av lägre klockfrekvenser.  ( 6 min )
    Helgsnack: Hur viktigt är märket på dina datorkomponenter?
    Fullfjädrad märkesdyrkare eller helt obrydd om fabrikatet. Denna helg diskuterar vi huruvida märket på produkter har betydelse när man väljer datorkomponenter.  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    AMD smartNICs to meld ASICs, FPGAs, Arm cores
    Why choose one when you can use them all? Hot Chips  Over the past two years, AMD has steadily expanded its computing portfolio. This included the addition of FPGAs and smartNICs through the acquisition of Xilinx in 2020 and Pensando earlier this year.…  ( 6 min )
    77% of security leaders fear we’re in perpetual cyberwar from now on
    Also, Charming Kittens from Iran scrape email inboxes, France could fine Google again, and more In brief  A survey of cybersecurity decision makers found 77 percent think the world is now in a perpetual state of cyberwarfare.…  ( 7 min )
    Sephora to pay $1.2m to settle Cali privacy law claims – and why this is a big deal
    Online shops sharing data about you with others qualifies as a sale in AG's book – and that means rules apply Sephora has agreed to cough up $1.2 million to settle claims it broke California's privacy law.…  ( 7 min )
  • Open

    Petting dogs in games is old news: in boomer shooter Ripout, you can pet your gun
    Ripout’s standout feature is not the retro-future 80’s aesthetic. It’s not the excellent gunplay, or the way little aliens that scurry around its industrial spaceships before attaching themselves to bigger aliens and coming to kill you. It’s not the looter shooter aspiration, nor is it the rogue-like setup of its levels. No, it’s the gun. Your gun. Your pet gun. That’s right, your gun is alive – and it’s not something incessant and irritating like your Johnson in Shadows of the Damned, or those endlessly quipping lunatic firearms in High on Life. Your gun is better; more ‘man’s best friend’ than ‘obnoxious bellend’. In Ripout, you wield a little pet alien, resembling something somewhere between a shrunken-down xenomorph and gothic gargoyle, that fires bullets from its maw and snatches body parts off grotesque aliens. And you can pet it, if you feel so obliged. This living weapon is at the center of everything Ripout is doing. The game, a self-confessed boomer shooter from a team of developers that take rich inspiration from 90s shooters, is a gameplay-first effort that has no cutscenes, no cinematics, and no “fluff” (per the creative director, Goran Rajsic). Instead, the 10-person strong development team has focused all its efforts on the shooting, the level setup, and – of course – your gun. Read more  ( 17 min )
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    Comic for 2022.08.27 - Sexy Genie
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )

  • Open

    Intel Details Inner Workings of XeSS
    Intel has detailed the inner workings of XeSS and provided performance and gaming examples of the technology.  ( 66 min )
    Best Filaments for 3D Printing
    We’ve tested scores of filaments to help you find the right material. So much plastic, so little time.  ( 79 min )
    LG Debuts UltraGear 45-Inch 240Hz Curved OLED Gaming Monitor
    The new UltraGear display is based on the same panel as the flexible Corsair Xeneon Flex 45WQHD240 OLED, but LG has decided to market its ‘45GR95QE’ in a fixed 800R configuration.  ( 60 min )
    The top three myths about gaming laptops
    GeForce RTX Series laptops are lightweight, thin and portable with battery extending tech; they deliver outstanding performance for STEM apps and creative software that’s many times faster than an average laptop, and prices start at just $799  ( 59 min )
    Zhaoxin's 12- and 16-Core CPUs Tested: Centaur Lives On
    Zhaoxin's datacenter 7nm CPUs with 12 and 16 cores tested in Geekbench.  ( 61 min )
    Core i7-13700 Shows Higher Single-Threaded Performance Than Core i9-12900K
    Intel's Core i7-13700, Core i5-13500, and Core i5-13400 Raptor Lake processors break cover.  ( 59 min )
    Intel Arc A770 Shown off in Case Modder Video
    While Intel's top-of-the-line Arc A770 is still missing from the wider world - alongside the rest of the Arc Alchemist lineup - Intel is flexing its marketing muscles by delivering its best-performing card to renowned case modders.  ( 59 min )
    Steam Deck 2: Valve Hints at Future of Handheld Gaming PCs
    There will be “more Steam Decks, more SteamOS," says Valve. Gamers can look forward to a “multi-generational product line.”  ( 59 min )
    Intel 13th-Gen Core i9-13900 Raptor Lake Allegedly Boosts to 5.58 GHz
    Intel's 65W Raptor Lake has extreme turbo clocks, 32 threads.  ( 60 min )
    AMD Zen 4 Ryzen 7000 AVX512 Optimizations Added to Upcoming Y-Cruncher Release
    Y-Cruncher Author Alexander Yee had to create all his Zen 4 optimizations of AVX-512 for Y-Cruncher by scratch. Nonetheless, he prevailed with Zen 4 support coming in next patch.  ( 59 min )
    Viotek GNV32DBE Review: Big Screen, Big Color, Big Contrast
    Viotek’s GNV32DBE delivers high contrast and a large color gamut with its GNV32DBE. A 32-inch curved VA screen features 165 Hz, Adaptive-Sync and HDR for less than $300.  ( 68 min )
  • Open

    Neodash levels are races through chaotic ether realms
    Not since the cruelly overlooked Blast-off has a game so accurately pressed the faster! button in my brain. Neodash is a type of racing game that pops up relatively often; a time trial crossed with an obstacle course and a little of what I suppose is the endless runner. Picture Trackmania but with the courses condensed into short bursts of high speed dodging and you're basically there. They're often very throwaway and don't really hold my interest for long. Neodash grabs hold immediately. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Killer Klowns From Outer Space: The Game devs detail classes, weapons and its terrifying balloon dogs
    I think it's fair to say Killer Klowns From Outer Space: The Game was one of the more... leftfield reveals from this week's Gamescom Opening Night Live bonanza. In case you missed it, it's a 3v7 asymmetrical multiplayer adaptation of the cult 1988 horror film of the same name, but details on how its creepy clowning around would actually work were few and far between, to say the least. Thankfully, I sat in on a developer presentation earlier this week to find out exactly how it stacks up to other asymmetrical horror film games out there at the moment, as well as how it hopes to evolve and redefine the hide-and-seek genre as a whole. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Rollerdrome review: a difficult but stylish skater-shooter that'll give you a shot of adrenaline
    Rollerdrome is an all-action skater/shooter set in a dystopian, but near, future. Protagonist Kara Hassan is the newest competitor in Matterhorn’s games, hosted by the corrupt International Rollerdrome Federation. Your job is to skate through 12 intense arena maps battling both the house players and yourself, dodging attacks as you replenish your ammo with sick tricks to stay in the fight. With enough combo multipliers and top completion times, you might come out as the champion. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Wild Arms and Shadow Hearts creators are back with two new JRPGs
    It's been a hot minute since I last crossed paths with JRPG series Wild Arms and Shadow Hearts, but today the key creators behind both of these late 90s and early 00s RPGs have announced they're making two brand-new JRPGs that are inspired by their previous works - and they're launching a 'double Kickstarter' campaign to help fund them. The games are called Penny Blood and Armed Fantasia (no points for guessing who's making what), and based on what I've seen so far, I'm intrigued. Read more  ( 18 min )
    WD's Black SN770 PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSD is down to £84 for a 1TB size
    The WD Black SN770 is a good middle-of-the-road PCIe 4.0 SSD, outperforming PCIe 3.0 SSDs while costing less than the very fastest PCIe 4.0 models. It launched at £125 for a 1TB size earlier this year, but now it's down to £84 where it's rather more fetching. The 2TB size has also been reduced and is even better value at £152. Here's why we rate these SSDs - and where to find them at the lowest price. Let's do the 'where to find them' bit first. It's quite simple: WD's UK store is offering the 1TB at the best price right now, while Ebuyer is the place to go if you'd prefer the larger 2TB model. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Our eight favourite games from Gamescom Opening Night Live
    It wouldn't be Gamescom without a Geoff Keighley liveshow to kick it all off, would it? Tuesday's Opening Night Live showcase featured a huge amount of trailers to gawk at, a baggage carousel of content that moved at a blistering clip. Despite its two hour runtime a lot of interesting (and in most cases, new) titles weren't given a huge amount space to breathe, their moment in the spotlight frequently cut short by another trailer waiting impatiently in the wings. You'd be forgiven, then, for missing a few bits and pieces because you were blinking really fast or distracted by the cat eating something unknown underneath your coffee table. Not to worry though, as I've once again gathered team RPS to tell me in detail about the games that caught their attention during Geoffcom 2022. Much like our E3 roundup from earlier in the summer, each RPS staffer took ten minutes out of their day to wax lyrical about an upcoming project featured within the showcase. All eight (including yours truly, who thanks to Katharine actually remembered to contribute this time around) chose completely different games. Some picks are more obvious, whereas others are a little off piste. In a good way, of course! Read more  ( 20 min )
    Get a 1TB Micro SD card for your Steam Deck for just £110
    The Steam Deck is a brilliant system, but its internal storage is limited - from anywhere from 64GB to 512GB depending on the model you chose. Thankfully, Micro SD cards are getting extremely affordable, even in massive sizes all the way up to 1TB. Smaller sizes like 256GB and 512GB are better value per gigabyte, but today in the UK there's been a big discount on a 1TB Lexar Play Micro SD card that brings it into contention too. The Lexar Play 1TB is now retailing for £110 at Amazon, compared to a usual price of £140. If you'd prefer something a little more high performance, the highly-rated SanDisk Extreme 1TB card is also on sale, dropping from £220 to £140. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Valve have made a free booklet about the origins of Steam and the Steam Deck
    Valve have produced a teensy digital booklet about the history of Steam and the Steam Deck as they prepare to introduce it to potential customers in the Asia-Pacific region. The 50-ish-page guide to everything Steam Deck also features a rundown of Valve’s relatively short history of manufacturing hardware such as the Steam Link and Steam Controller, and the Valve Index VR headset. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Embracer Group complete acquisition of former Square Enix studios
    Swedish media buyer-uppers Embracer Group have completed their $300 million (£253 million) acquisition of former Square Enix studios, begun in May this year. The deal sees Crystal Dynamics, Eidol Montréal and Square Enix Montréal become part of a 12th operating group within Embracer. Square Enix Montréal will now change their name. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Minecraft Legends is a colourful mix of real-time strategy and snappy building
    Minecraft Legends was first announced at Geoff Fest earlier this year, and a smidge more footage dropped again at a Nintendo Direct Mini. But despite both of these events, it's been difficult to ascertain what the game actually, well, is. Aside from being a real-time strategy spin-off, there's been nothing else to scan with our eyeballs for more info. Colour me intrigued, then, as I sat in a quickfire presentation at this year's Gamescom and bore witness to some mythical gameplay. I can now report that what Minecraft Legends appears to be is as mix of real-time strategy and building, made all the more approachable by being set in Minecraft's colourful cube-verse. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Dead Island 2 is a surprisingly polished zombie 'em up that sticks to the script
    Eight years ago Graham (who used to be to blame for all of this) got hands-on with Dead Island 2, back when the game was being developed by Yager, the folks behind Spec Ops: The Line. Since then, development changed hands like a baton at the Olympic relay; Yager left a year later, to be replaced by Sumo Digital, only for Sumo Digital to leave and be replaced by Dambuster Studios. Usain Bolt hasn't expressed interest yet, but there's time. So going into a 20-minute hands-on with the game in the year 2022, I was a bit apprehensive. What sort of Frankenstinian horror awaited me behind closed doors? But, far from a shambling mess, what I played was a zombie 'em up that seemed close to what Graham saw in 2014, only polished up to a surprising, bloody gloss. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Deliver Us Mars is a bigger, prettier, more physical space sequel
    Dunno if you’ve noticed by there’s an awful lot of sci-fi games on the way, most of which – these being games – revolve around shooting space creatures to glowing green bits. Deliver Us Mars, the recently delayed sequel to Deliver Us The Moon, takes a more peaceful option, now blending the original’s puzzling with some Tomb Raider reboot-style platforming. Your deadliest enemy here is gravity, and as far as I understand, you can’t shoot that. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Report: Amazon are announcing plans to buy EA today
    Amazon are intending to announce they’ve made an offer to buy publishing colossus Electronic Arts later today, according to a new report from USA Today’s For The Win, who cite sources from Swedish gaming agency GLHF. No clue yet as to how much they’d be paying, but it’s likely to be ranging in the hundreds of millions to billions of dollars. Maybe just not as many as Microsoft’s $68.7 billion buyout of Activision Blizzard, revealed in January. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Indie horror showcase EEK3 goes bump again tonight
    Skully the Skeleton is back for another yearly look at indie horror games at today’s EEK3 showcase. The scares begin at 11pm BST/12am CEST/3pm PST, so particularly spooky if you live on the main European landmass. As one person noted, Friday the 26th is twice as scary as the 13th. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Netflix's BioShock movie finds its director in The Hunger Games series' Francis Lawrence
    Streaming giants Netflix have a BioShock movie to make and, after pointing their golf club at various directors, they’ve selected Francis Lawrence. He’s best known for overseeing three of The Hunger Games movies and is working on the prequel coming out next year, The Ballad Of Songbirds And Snakes. Netflix have also hired screenwriter Michael Green for the BioShock flick. Green wrote the Kenneth Branagh versions of Agatha Christie’s Murder On The Orient Express and Death On The Nile. I guess that means he’s got experience of period settings. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Harvestella demonstrates its delightful vegetable names
    Harvestella is Square Enix's chill life simulation game about farming and crystals. It was announced back in June, but a trunk of new details was released today including a lengthy video demonstration in the middle of Nintendo's Treehouse livestream at Gamescom. Watch it below, if only to read the delightful vegetable names. Read more  ( 16 min )
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    What are you playing this weekend?
    For some of us it's a three day weekend, thanks to a Bank Holiday on Monday. Three day weekends are always nice, as it gives you an extra day to refresh before starting a new week. Next weekend in the US will be a three day weekend, thanks to Labor Day falling on the first Monday of September. So, what do those of us with a Bank Holiday plan on doing over the weekend? We're going to play some games. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Last of Us Part 1 will feature plenty of accessibility options
    Naughty Dog has outlined accessibility options included in The Last of Us Part 1. In the remake, there will be audio descriptions for cinematics, haptic feedback for dialogue, and many more accessibility features. There will be accessibility features for blind and deaf players and those with motor accessibility needs. The largest new feature is the audio descriptions for cinematics as part of a collaboration with Descriptive Video Works. These descriptions will be integrated into all cutscenes and across all localized. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Aliens: Dark Descent is more than an XCOM clone - and feels surprisingly true to the movies
    For some reason, despite the fact that I rather like the Alien film franchise and absolutely bloody love the squad-based tactics best exemplified by XCOM, Aliens: Dark Descent wasn’t really on my radar. After a hands-off demo of the game, however, it’s rocketed into my most-anticipated list. I’m not sure why I wasn’t on board before. It might have been because the Alien franchise has a fairly checkered history in games, and recently also in film - though of course, it also gave us Alien Isolation, so I shouldn’t write the franchise off without due diligence. Maybe, though, it is because XCOM is just so damn good that every time I see an XCOM-alike, I wonder why I’d play it over the strategy genre perfection put out by Firaxis in the form of XCOM 2. But like I said, seeing this demo of Aliens: Dark Descent immediately drives home why I should shelve that attitude and give this game some love. There’s two key reasons - first is simply that it just looks really good. The second, however, is just as important: this game is much more than an XCOM clone with a movie license. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty gameplay trailer shows fast-paced, high-flying action
    Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty is a slow burning title that’s slowly heating up and bringing the hype to fans of third person action titles. One of next year’s most dynamic and aggressive titles has just gotten a new gameplay trailer, giving us a brief glimpse of what we have to look forward to. Launching in 2023 on Xbox, PC, PlayStation, and available day one on Game Pass, the Team Ninja melee extravaganza takes us to Three Kingdoms era of China as the Han Dynasty is crumbling to pieces. You, as a militia soldier fighting to survive the kerfuffle, will have to fend off demons and other dangers across this spectacular moment in history. Being based in Three Kingdoms China, combat is based on Chinese sword-based martial arts as you dash and weave between incoming attacks and strike at weak points. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Elden Ring doesn't technically have input reading, but it might as well have
    A controversial aspect in challenging video games is artificial difficulty. One way this can manifest is input reading, a technique that allows the game's AI to respond to certain player moves in order to consistently punish them. Since its release, many Elden Ring players suspected that a few of the game's bosses, especially those who have given us all the hardest time, can read our control inputs, which wades into unfair territory. This idea isn't actually new, and has been brought up time and again with other FromSoftware games, more recently with Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. But Elden Ring is a massive game by any standard, so while those instances are few compared to the sheer number of bosses the game has, there are enough of them to raise a few eyebrows. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak Title Update 2 releasing at the end of September, adds Flaming Espinas
    Capcom has announced when to expect the next Title Update for Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak. According to the latest video for the game, you can expect Title Update 2 to drop sometime around the end of September. The firm also teased one of the monsters coming to the game, Flaming Espinas, and noted to expect several rare species and powered-up monsters with the update. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Ninja or Die is a genius indie, and Gamescom 2022’s best-kept secret
    One of the greatest delights in gaming is undoubtedly being completely surprised by a new and unknown title. The sort of thing where your learning of a game’s existence and becoming extremely excited for the full release are separated only by a matter of minutes. It’s a difficult feeling to provoke, and so isn’t that common - but this week it happened to me again, with a little indie called Ninja or Die. Coming from one-man Japanese developer Nao Games, Ninja or Die is a sort of indie I do feel we’ve seen before - a hard as nails roguelike with pixel art so sharp you feel like you could cut yourself on it. And yet, it stands apart as unique - and as an absolutely killer twist on this concept. Much of what sets it apart is down to its control scheme and the skill-set of the titular ninja, which offers a very simple concept: every core action is tied to a single button and action. Jumping, attacking, and parrying are all handled with the same input and action. The protagonist can’t even walk - movement is accomplished through stringing together leaps, wall-jumps, and ground-based dashes, all triggered with that one single button. Read more  ( 17 min )
    The Netflix Bioshock film adaptation has found its director and writer
    The waters are churning around the Netflix film adaptation of Bioshock today, as both the director and scriptwriter have been named in a public Twitter post from the official Netflix account. While it’s still very early days for the project — as you may expect considering the fact they’re only now announcing who is filling important roles on the project — it does mark a major milestone on the next big video game adaption from the massive digital media company. Looking at the roles, we have Francis Lawrence as the director. They’ve previously worked on well known blockbusters such as I Am Legend, Hunger Games: Catching Fire as well as both Mockingjay films. But forget all that — this guy also worked on Black Eyed Peas’ Pump It music video, as well as Gwen Stefani’s What You Waiting For, and Jennifer Lopez's Jenny from the Block. Gold star. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Horror game showcase, EEK3, will showcase scary indies - watch it here
    EEK3 marks the third annual showcase from Haunted PS1, a community dedicated to showcasing indie horror games that have a style which hails back to the PS1 era. Prepare for plenty of low-poly models and jagged aliasing, because that exactly is what this stream is preparing to show off. The showcase's call for submissions was announced via YouTube back in March, running until May 31, and now it's only a matter of hours before it's revealed with games made the cut. The most exciting thing about this neat, niche showcase is the lack of leaks; we've truly no idea what games will be shown, which has us gearing up for a rather thrilling Friday night of indie reveals. Last year's EEK3 showcase was incredibly haunted indeed, and a handful of the titles shown might've already been familiar to Haunted PS1 fans as being a part of 2021's Haunted PS1 Demo Disc from a few months prior. We're yet to see the Demo Disc for 2022, but that's yet another thing to look forward to, and here's to hoping we might be able to sample some of the games shown off at this year's EEK3. Although, if you're unfamiliar, you're likely wondering what even is the Haunted PS1 Demo Disc? Read more  ( 17 min )
    VG247's The Best Games Ever Podcast – Ep.14: Best game you’d fire into space to prove the Earth isn’t worth saving
    In my final year of Primary School the whole of Year 6 worked together to create a time capsule. This was nothing new, I’m sure. No doubt that school field is now almost impossible to navigate with stepping on precious artifacts of a bygone era. But, the point is, we were attempting to put together a package that one day would be looked at by future children (probably with hover boots, and hover cars, and hover food, and hover dogs), so they could appreciate the wonderful world we lived in. My memory is a little hazy about the exact specifics of the items included, but there was definitely a Troll with bright orange hair. There was a piece of a sponge football (useful!), some braided string, a packet of pickled onion Space Raiders crisps (Best Before Date well before the capsule was due to be uncovered), and one of those bike reflectors that you got in packets of Frosties cereal. All absolutely perfect examples of early ‘90s childhood, I think you’ll agree. Unfortunately, there wasn’t room for everyone in Year 6 to donate an item, but because I was undoubtedly the most popular, smartest child in the school at that time I was given the opportunity to put forth an item. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Amazon is reportedly acquiring EA, with an announcement set to drop today
    We may be hours away from the biggest news of the week. According to a new report, Amazon is close to announcing a deal to acquire EA later this Friday. The report does not say how much the deal is going to be worth, only that Amazon has officially made an offer. The news comes via a USA Today report, citing sources familiar with the matter. That's pretty much the extent of the information available today, but it's not actually surprising considering recent news. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Layers of Fears shares Gamescom trailer, revealing a 'new story chapter'
    Bloober Team is back with yet another spine-tingling trainer for the upcoming psychological horror game, Layers of Fears. The game was first announced back in June, but we know a lot more about what to expect when it releases in early 2023. Bloober Team are certainly no stranger to the genre, having already developed The Medium and Blair Witch, and this time around, the team is developing the Layers of Fear sequel alongside Anshar Studios. Layers of Fears is not a direct sequel to 2016's Layers of Fear or even 2019's Layers of Fear 2. Instead, the new game will be remastering the two titles and DLC to combine them into a single, scary reimagination of the series with new, additional plot lines and Unreal Engine 5 technology. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Don’t worry, PS5 price increase isn’t going to affect Xbox
    Yesterday, Sony made what's likely to go down as one of the most surprising news of the year, if not the entire console generation. The platform holder announced a price increase for both of its PS5 editions in most regions, except the US. The announcement created a wave of shock amongst fans, not just because of what Sony cited as the reasons behind this unusual decision, but also because of the implications it could have on the wider industry - including rival Xbox. Well, it looks like - for now at least - Microsoft is not contemplating a similar price hike for Xbox Series X or Series S. A Microsoft spokesperson told Windows Central that the prices of both consoles will remain as they are today in USD, EUR, and GBP. Read more  ( 15 min )
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    Nobody Saves the World launching Frozen Hearth DLC next month
    Guacamelee developer Drinkbox Studios has announced Frozen Hearth, a new chunk of paid DLC heading to its action-RPG Nobody Saves the World on 13th September. Frozen Hearth takes players to a forgotten new region, deep underground, "where the strongest warriors compete for glory in The Tempering". Here, hardy adventurers can tackle a series of puzzles and challenges intended to test their transformation skills and creativity, unlocking the new Killer Bee and Mechanic forms that can be used in the DLC and main game. "When we shipped the original game, there were so many ideas we had to leave on the cutting room floor, and this DLC gave us a chance to bring some of them to life," Nobody Saves the World lead designer Ian Campbell explained in a statement accompanying today's announcement. "We had a blast creating even more forms, as well as puzzles and challenges that make the most of the game’s mix-and-match customisation". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Warframe's Veilbreaker update brings 50th Warframe Styanax, new story quest and more next month
    Digital Extremes has shared more on Warframe's incoming Veilbreaker update, confirming it'll be launching for all platforms some time in September, and that players will be able to get Styanax, the free-to-play sci-fi shooter's 50th Warframe, free for a "limited time" upon its arrival. Styanax - who gets a proper introduction in the animated trailer below - is described as a "mighty and herculean" Warframe whose designed is inspired by the ancient Greek warrior Astyanax. His abilities include the Axios Javelin - which can push back enemies on impact, causing damage if they hit a wall - and the Tharros Strike shield, capable of repelling enemies and reducing their shields and armour as it's swung around, regenerating Styanax's health with each successfully landed blow. Styanax can also call on Rally Point to draw enemies to his position and regenerate the energy and shields of nearby allies (regeneration increases as the number of enemies near him grows), or deploy Final Stand - causing him to rise into the air and unleash a barrage of javelins that'll damage nearby enemies upon hitting the ground. Additional damage occurs on a direct hit. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The scale in Homeworld 3 is tremendous - it's a space RTS for the James Webb era
    Homeworld is back: that's Homeworld 3 in a nutshell. It's the real-time strategy series you remember and, probably, what you want it to be now. And actually, to hear Rob Cunningham tell it in our interview below - he who helped dream up Homeworld and co-founded Relic, and now leads Blackbird, the studio making Homeworld 3 - this game is actually what they always wanted Homeworld 2 to be. Computers just couldn't handle it at the time. But now they can. They can handle this big idea of using space wreckage as cover to hide behind, fly through, sneak around - use it like a theatrical set you can play tricks on your opponents with. I'm over here - no not really, I'm over here! And I've played Homeworld 3 for about an hour and the idea really works. More importantly, it's simple to use. No fussy controls govern it; your cursor shows how ships will interact with a piece of scenery and then they do. They will make trench-runs on their own with only a simple instruction - trench-runs! They'll fly through huge engine shafts of colossal wrecks on their own - peekaboo! They'll even use nearby cover automatically while preparing for another attack run. They are not dumb: they won't fly into walls and scenery if you leave them unattended. And it's fun. And those two words "it's fun" are crucial to what Homeworld 3 is about. It's as though the faff of the old games has been tidied away - but not sacrificed - to enable the exciting parts of the formula to come through. And what really comes through for me is space. Read more  ( 27 min )
    Sifu getting new scoring system, more modifiers in next week's big update
    Developer Sloclap has detailed Sifu's big summer update - which is set to bring the likes of a new scoring system and gameplay modifiers - ahead of its arrival next Wednesday, 31st August. Top of the list of new additions for the kung-fu beat-'em-up is the aforementioned new scoring system, which will "take into account every punch, kick, sweep and finisher performed" in order to rank players based on smoothness, efficiency and variety. "Dismantle a group of enemies without getting hit," Sloclap adds, "and players will be greeted with a score worth flaunting." Elsewhere, next week's update brings a range of modifiers designed to suit all tastes. At one end of the spectrum, struggling players will be able to significantly reduce Sifu's challenge by giving themselves the likes of infinite health, structure, and unbreakable weapons. Those looking to further test their mettle, however, can prevent themselves from picking up weapons and set enemies to ignore guarding, or go even further by reducing their character down to a single hit point and bumping enemy strength up even further. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Get the Logitech G502 Hero, the most popular gaming mouse, for £24
    After one of the most popular and best gaming mice of the last few years? Logitech's legendary G502 Hero is on sale for a historic low price. Use code BANKHOLIPLAY at checkout to take 30 percent off the G502 Hero, dropping its price from £35 to a ludicrously good value £24. For context, this mouse is still selling for £80 from Logitech direct - and was retailing for £40 on Amazon as recently as two days ago. The G502 is one of the best-selling gaming mice of all time, and it's for good reason, too. The broad ergonomic shape feels comfortable for hours on end, there are 11 programmable buttons and the dual-mode scroll wheel remains unique, changing between a no-friction glide and a properly chunky tactile steps at the push of a button. The G502 Hero is also heavier than many mice on the market today, and even features additional weights if you prefer a weightier mouse. The G502 Hero is the latest version of the mouse to debut, alongside the more expensive Lightspeed version, and comes with the titular Hero sensor. It's one of the best optical mouse sensors on the market, and is rated up to 25600 DPI in case you like your mouse to move very fast indeed. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Last of Us Part 1 accessibility features include ability to play dialogue through DualSense as haptic feedback
    A new blog post has laid out all of the upcoming accessibility features for The Last of Us Part 1 on the PlayStation 5. This includes a new feature that will enable players to play dialogue through the console's DualSense controller as haptic feedback. This new feature, which started off as a prototype, means that "a deaf player can feel the way a line is delivered, can feel the emphasis, along with the subtitles to give some sense of how that line is delivered," explained game director Matthew Gallant. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Dead by Daylight's Resident Evil chapter now has a release date
    Dead by Daylight's Resident Evil chapter will release on 30th August. Called Project W, it's the second Resident Evil collaboration between developer Behaviour Interactive and Capcom. Albert Wesker will be the new Killer, while Ada Wong and Rebecca Chambers will be new Survivors. Read more  ( 15 min )
    See first gameplay of Team Ninja's Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty in new trailer
    A new trailer for Team Ninja's Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty has been released, showing off gameplay for the first time. The Soulslike game was announced during the Xbox and Bethesda Showcase in June and will be released in 2023 across Xbox consoles and PC (Game Pass on both), and PlayStation consoles. It's led by producers Fumihiko Yasuda (Nioh) and Masaaki Yamagiwa (Bloodborne), and judging by the below trailer it certainly looks familiar. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The white Xbox Elite Series 2 controller has been sighted again
    The long-rumoured white Xbox Elite Series 2 controller - pictured above - has been spotted again online. Earlier this month, footage of the controller surfaced on YouTube, and pictures of its packaging were posted to Twitter back in March. Microsoft has not made an official statement regarding the white controller's release, or even acknowledging that it is real, but more solid evidence of its existence has appeared. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Nintendo Switch's lowest resolution games tested - and how a next-gen successor could boost image quality
    The Nintendo Switch wasn't pushing the envelope in terms of performance when it launched with an modest Tegra X1 chip back in 2017, but its relatively modern graphics meant that the system could run recent titles without a massive development effort. On the flipside, its meagre levels of compute performance - a necessary compromise for a power-limited mobile device - often required big sacrifices to rendering resolution. With the Switch reportedly soon to be replaced by a successor, we thought we'd survey some of these efforts to see just how low-res the most demanding titles got - so just how low can the Nintendo Switch go? First, some ground rules. We've evaluated these games by their lowest typical resolution, in portable mode, with full 3D graphics - but note that this is meant to be a sampling rather than a definitive list. The first game I looked at is firmly in standard definition territory. Crash Team Racing: Nitro Fueled renders at 854x480 in portable play, with no anti-aliasing. When you're at a resolution this low, AA sometimes hurts more than it helps, so you will notice that several of these titles drop the technique entirely. In practice, Crash Team Racing looks quite messy in motion on the Switch - the screen is flooded with jagged edges. On the plus side it does look fairly sharp, but it certainly does distract from what is otherwise a solid version of the kart racing remake. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Disney Dreamlight Valley has a free character creator available now
    Disney Dreamlight Valley has a free character creator you can download now ahead of the game's release. Developed by Gameloft, it's a free-to-play Disney farming sim that has players harvesting crops and meeting a variety of Disney characters. The character creator is available on Steam and Epic and gives players a chance to fiddle around with their own character. Kingdom Hearts fans will surely be happy. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Embracer Group completes acquisition of Square Enix's western studios
    Embracer Group has now completed its acquisition of Square Enix's western studios, namely Crystal Dynamics, Eidos-Montréal, and Square Enix Montréal. Back in May, Square Enix sold off its western studios and IP (including Tomb Raider and Deus Ex) to Embracer for just $300m. Now, three months later, the acquisition has been completed, according to a press release from Embracer. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Here's a lengthy look at Square Enix's fantasy farming sim Harvestella
    As part of its latest Treehouse: Live showcase, Nintendo has shared a lengthy look at Square Enix's upcoming fantasy farming sim Harvestella, showing off its story, its world exploration and combat, its farming, fishing, and more. Harvestella - a sort of blend of Final Fantasy, Harvest Moon, and Rune Factory - begins with players waking up with a bad case of amnesia in a world where the seasons are governed by four giant crystals known as Seaslight. Unfortunately for the locals, something has gone awry and a deadly dust known as the Quietus has started seeping from the crystals, trapping people indoors and causing crops to wither and die. And that's not the end of their problems; as players settle into a vacant house on the outskirts of Lethe Village, a huge comet falls to the earth nearby, bringing with it the armoured body of an Omen, thought to be the cause of the calamity. We see some of this in Nintendo's showcase, but the bulk of the play-through is focused around Harvestella's second chapter as players start to explore the dungeon-like Higan Canyon, with help from new pal Dianthus. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Nintendo responds to PlayStation price hike
    Nintendo has joined Microsoft in responding to this week's shock PlayStation 5 price hike, and said it had "no plans" to similarly bump up the Nintendo Switch's cost. In a statement issued to Eurogamer this morning, Nintendo confirmed it had "no plans to increase the trade price of its hardware". The response goes further than that of Microsoft's, which last night noted Sony's dramatic decision by simply stating it was keen to "offer our fans great gaming options", before reiterating the Xbox Series X and S's launch price point. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Splatoon fans think they've found the franchise's flooded world map
    Fans think they've found a world map which shows off the Splatoon series' flooded planet in full detail. As a reminder, Splatoon lore fans believe that Nintendo's shooter series is set in a post-apocalyptic future where the sea levels have risen and much of our current world is underwater. Indeed, the new map - apparently uncovered from the files of Splatoon 3's World Premiere Splatfest demo - appears to support that claim. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Puzzle Bobble Everybubble! is a Nintendo Switch exclusive
    Puzzle Bobble Everybubble! is a new Puzzle Bobble game exclusive to Nintendo Switch. If you don't know what Puzzle Bobble is, it started out as a match-three arcade game based off Bubble Bobble. Players are faced with a prearranged pattern of coloured bubbles, and must fire bubbles up towards their matching colours to clear the screen before the bubbles get too low. Bubble Bobble's Puzzle Bobble's Puzzle Bobble Everybubble! sure is one heck of a tongue twister. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Amazon planning to buy EA - report
    Online retail giant Amazon is set to announce an offer to buy FIFA publisher EA, a new report has claimed. USA Today sources state that Amazon will formally announce its offer later today. There's no detail yet on how much it will bid. EA has recently been the subject of several takeover rumours, with Apple and Disney also claimed to be among other interested parties. Read more  ( 14 min )
    You can now download a booklet from Valve chronicling "the story of Steam Deck"
    To celebrate the upcoming launch of the Steam Deck in Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, Valve has released a new booklet all about the company, Steam, and its handheld Steam Deck PC. This booklet is just over 50 pages long, and is available in Japanese, Korean, Traditional Chinese, and English. It covers some background information on the company, as well as an overview of Steam including "how it came to be and where it is now", and the "story of Steam Deck". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Denuvo won't affect Switch performance, spokesperson claims
    Denuvo has clarified more details of its upcoming Nintendo Switch Emulator Protection solution, which it announced earlier this week. In its announcement, the company invited publishers to include Denuvo's anti-tamper software in Switch games to help crack down on piracy and PC emulation. But many fans were not happy with Denuvo's involvement, worried about the effect the software may have on performance. A Denuvo spokeperson has since responded to questions surrounding the software, as well as the driving parties behind it. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Big the Cat finally seen in Sonic Frontiers
    We've finally seen Big the Cat in Sonic Frontiers. The big purple creature first appeared in Sonic Adventure on the Dreamcast and has since become a fan favourite character, appearing in a number of games in the series. It's been known for a while that Big the Cat would feature, but thanks to Twitter user Bibs he's been spotted with Sonic in-game at Gamescom. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Total War, Hyenas developer Creative Assembly announces new "action project"
    Developer Creative Assembly has revealed it is working on a new "action project" that will sit alongside the likes of Total War and its long-in-the-works sci-fi shooter Hyenas. But don't expect to hear more on this project anytime soon, Creative Assembly said today. Instead, there will be a "significant wait before further details are revealed" on this new franchise. Intriguingly, the company noted it also had plans for a separate "yet to be announced project". While Creative Assembly did not go into any specifics about what its new action project will look like, it did state that its studio in Sofia would be leading its development, and noted it was now looking for candidates to join the team that had "experience working on third-person titles using the Unreal 5 engine". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Need for Speed gameplay snippet leaks online
    A first glimpse at gameplay from the next Need for Speed has popped up online, showing off the game's new visual style. Reportedly due out this November, publisher EA has officially kept very quiet about its upcoming racer, which was previously delayed from 2021. This week, screenshots apparently from a work-in-progress build of the still-untitled game began to appear on reddit. Last night, the brief gameplay clip these images were taken from was also posted. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Surgeon Simulator and other Bossa Studios IP bought by TinyBuild for £3m
    Bossa Studios' various gaming franchises has been acquired by publisher TinyBuild for $3m. Those franchises include Surgeon Simulator, I am Fish, and I am Bread, which will now be developed by TinyBuild to allow Bossa to focus on other projects, GamesIndustry.biz reported this morning. TinyBuild is known for publishing indie games, including the likes of Hello Neighbor, Graveyard Keeper, Pathologic 2 and more. Read more  ( 15 min )
    What we've been playing
    Hello! Welcome back to our regular feature where we write a little bit about some of the games we've found ourselves playing over the last few days. This time: Final Fantasy, Final Fantasy, and one of the greatest games of all time. If you fancy catching up on some of the older editions of What We've Been Playing, here's our archive. When people talk about Final Fantasy 7, I go a bit quiet because, between you and me, I never actually played it. And I know, I know, but I didn't have a PlayStation so how could I? All I could do was go to my friend's house and watch him play, but there's a limit to how long you can do that before it gets weird and the parents throw you out. Read more  ( 18 min )
  • Open

    The number of companies caught up in the Twilio hack keeps growing
    2FA provider Authy, password manager LastPass, and DoorDash all experienced breaches.  ( 5 min )
    Some day we’ll be recycling wind turbine blades into yummy gummy bears
    Recyclable polymer resin could also be used for car taillights, diapers, kitchen sinks.  ( 7 min )
    Poopy lettuce at Wendy’s still prime suspect in outbreak that just doubled
    Wendy's has already pulled the suspect lettuce from its burgers and sandwiches.  ( 6 min )
    Walmart lists a 30TB portable SSD for $39. It is, naturally, a scam
    But the "30TB" disk does at least try to fool users in clever ways.  ( 5 min )
    COVID coalition over, Moderna sues Pfizer and BioNTech over vaccines
    With vaccines widely available, Moderna wants to be paid for its earlier work.  ( 6 min )
    Meta’s next VR headset will launch in October
    The headset is likely Project Cambria, and it will debut at Connect.  ( 5 min )
    Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 10 review: A fast-but-flawed version of a great laptop
    Intel's 12th-gen CPUs make for a mixed upgrade to one of the best laptops.  ( 7 min )
    LG’s 4K monitor physically adjusts itself so you don’t have to
    LG claims a camera and AI help ensure good ergonomics.  ( 6 min )
    MacBook self-repair program highlights Apple’s flawed repairability progress
    Apple's more amenable to self-repairs, but complex processes and designs are limiting.  ( 7 min )
    Rocket Report: At long last the SLS is ready, Alpha gets a launch date
    "For the uncrewed demo, the goal is to have a safe landing."  ( 6 min )
    Audi will build F1 engines, entering the sport in 2026
    Audi is one of two VW Group brands that will enter F1 when the new rules come in.  ( 5 min )
    Forget 5G wireless, SpaceX and T-Mobile want to offer Zero-G coverage
    "So it's really quite a difficult technical challenge."  ( 7 min )
    An herbal remedy caused the death of CA congressman’s wife
    A bit of undigested white mulberry leaf was found in the woman's stomach.  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    PyPI warns of first-ever phishing campaign against its users
    On the bright side, top devs are getting hardware security keys The Python Package Index, better known among developers as PyPI, has issued a warning about a phishing attack targeting developers who use the service.…  ( 5 min )
    Micron wants tax breaks for '$160b' Texas chip fab plant
    If it ever gets built, that is US memory vendor Micron is seeking tax incentives to build a new semiconductor fab outside Austin, Texas, according to documents filed with the state.…  ( 4 min )
    James Webb Space Telescope finds first evidence of CO2 in exoplanet atmosphere
    This same tech could someday help us discover strange, new – and habitable – worlds NASA is reporting another James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) first as the orbital observatory has found clear evidence for carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of an exoplanet.…  ( 5 min )
    DoorDash customer info caught up in Oktapus arms
    Attack's tentacles spread wider DoorDash has confirmed that "a small percentage" of its customers' data and employees' information, including names, email and delivery addresses, phone numbers, and order and partial credit card details, were revealed as part of a broad phishing campaign dubbed Oktapus.…  ( 5 min )
    Nichelle Nichols' ashes set for trek to the stars
    The memorial 'Enterprise Flight' later this year will include ashes from other Star Trek alum too Late actress Nichelle Nichols, who for 25 years portrayed the USS Enterprise's communications officer Lieutenant Nyota Uhura, is set to be memorialized among the stars later this year.…  ( 4 min )
    How Arm popped CHERI architecture into Morello Program hardware
    Chip giant aims to adapt existing processor architectures to close off vulnerabilities in memory access Hot Chips  Arm used the Hot Chips conference to talk about its experimental Morello Program and how it implements the CHERI architecture, designed to address some of the memory access vulnerabilities underpinning attacks on computer systems.…  ( 8 min )
    T-Mobile and SpaceX hope to deliver phone service from space
    Companies claim that 'no modifications are required to the cellphone everyone has in their pocket today' T-Mobile and SpaceX have announced plans to use satellites in low Earth orbit to provide cellphone coverage in remote locations across the US and perhaps globally using existing devices.…  ( 6 min )
    EA shares volatile on the back of unconfirmed rumor of Amazon bid
    Early reports Amazon planned to announce a buy offer for the game studio make share price zigzag Electronic Arts stock has been volatile this morning on rumors that Amazon was preparing to put in an offer to buy the company that were quickly deemed questionable.…  ( 4 min )
    Zuckerberg: Yes, Facebook kept Hunter Biden's laptop under wraps
    Also: Smiling, eye tracking, and general 'social presence' baked into Project Cambria Facebook limited the visibility of the New York Post's story about Hunter Biden's laptop on the social media platform while it was being fact-checked after receiving warnings of disinformation campaigns from the FBI, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg told the Joe Rogan Experience on Thursday.…  ( 5 min )
    Micro Focus bought by Canada's OpenText for $6b
    Resting place of Novell – and one-time home to SUSE – finds new life in the Great White North Canadian software biz OpenText has bought UK tech stalwart Micro Focus in a deal worth around $6 billion.…  ( 5 min )
    The internet's edge routers are all so different. What if we unified them with software?
    Wouldn't it be nice to have the features you want, rather than accept whatever's bundled by suppliers Systems Approach  Edge routers have been an essential part of the internet for decades, connecting access networks – enterprise LANs, mobile and broadband networks – to the global backbone.…  ( 7 min )
    Doctor gave patients the wrong test results due to 'printer problems'
    The diagnosis? Ignorance is bliss, but educating users is hell On Call  If it's Friday – and we have no reason to believe it is not – then it must be time for another instalment of On-Call, The Register's weekly tale of techies who rise above the trivial troubles that colleagues demand be addressed with undue haste.…  ( 4 min )
    Google Maps, search results to point women to actual abortion providers
    And not the fake ones that just try to change their minds Google search results and Maps will clearly label healthcare clinics that provide abortion services, reducing the chances that women in crisis will be misdirected to "clinics" that don't in fact offer healthcare.…  ( 5 min )
    Google says there's no Waze forward, carpool app axed
    Navigation tool still on the road ... for now Google is shutting down its Waze carpooling service apparently due to poor demand from workers commuting into the office – although road traffic has bounced back to levels from the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. …  ( 4 min )
    Twilio, Cloudflare just two of 135 orgs targeted by Oktapus phishing campaign
    This, this is what we mean by a sophisticated cyberattack Criminals behind the cyberattack attempts on Twilio and Cloudflare earlier this month had cast a much wider net in their phishing expedition, targeting as many as 135 organizations — primarily IT, software development and cloud services providers based in the US.…  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    You can get Shadow of Mordor, Shadow of War and more in this bundle
    Ready for the weekend? Humble Bundle just put up the Fantastic Journeys: Middle-earth and Beyond bundle and it's actually pretty darn good.  ( 4 min )
    Lutris adds Amazon Games integration, plus Flatpak finally out (good for Steam Deck)
    Lutris, the all encompassing game manager for installing games from various stores and services (both Native and with Wine / Proton) has a new version out. Plus, the Flatpak is finally ready, making it real easy to run on Steam Deck.  ( 4 min )
    Steam Deck has a new Client Beta with more Steam Input improvements
    A small but interesting Steam Deck update available in Beta and Preview, which you can try out right now. Here's what's new.  ( 4 min )
    Escape the rising waters and take on refugees in Diluvian Winds - new trailer up
    Diluvian Winds continues looking interesting. Alambik Studio and Goblinz Publishing are working to bring out a 2D management and building game where you're trying to fight against the rising waters that's left you exiled.  ( 4 min )
    No more dungeons, overtake the overworld tile by tile in Overboss
    Overboss looks like a fun idea. Coming from the same team that gave us Legend of Keepers, it has you emerge from the underworld to take over the overworld.  ( 4 min )
    Get a free copy of cyberpunk RPG 'Dex' in The GOG Sale
    The GOG Sale continues on and their next free giveaway has been revealed as the cyberpunk action RPG named Dex.  ( 4 min )
    Steam Deck 2 is absolutely coming, new booklet from Valve confirms
    Valve has just released a rather fancy Steam Deck Booklet to introduce Valve, Steam and the Steam Deck to the new markets across Asia they're about to expand into and it gives some fun details.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Strategispelet Minecraft Legends får en riktigt grisig trailer
    Nöff nöff.  ( 6 min )
    Aloy bekräftad som huvudkaraktär i Netflix Horizon-serie
    Och The Umbrella Academy-producenten leder produktionen.  ( 6 min )
    Jordbruk och strider i 30 minuters video från Harvestella
    Square Enix kommande livssimulator.  ( 6 min )
    Det här spelar FZ i helgen - Vad spelar du?
    Från gamla Dreamcast-lir till klassisk Total War-strategi och Håkan Hellström.  ( 6 min )
    FZ Play - Vi stoppar (förhoppningsvis) apokalypsen i Soul Hackers 2
    Start klockan 20.  ( 5 min )
    Diskutera - Dina bästa spelminnen!
    På med nostalgiglasögonen!  ( 6 min )
    Uppgift: Amazon vill köpa EA
    Ett bud ska komma i dag, enligt uppgift.  ( 6 min )
    Helikoptrar landar i MS Flight Simulator i november
    Serien fyller 40, firar med gratis plan till oss alla.  ( 6 min )
    Bioshock-filmen ska ha fått regissör och författare
    Hunger Games-regissören styr skutan mot Rapture.  ( 6 min )
    Ska du segla Skull and Bones på pc? Här är systemkraven
    Låga lägstakrav.  ( 6 min )
    Microsoft efter PS5-prishöjningen: Xbox Series-priserna ligger kvar
    Inga planer just nu på att ändra prislappen på Xbox Series-konsolerna.  ( 6 min )
    Populära Dysmantle har fått sin första expansion: Underworld
    Men spelarna är inte helt slagna med häpnad.  ( 6 min )
    Ubisoft berättar mer om utforskandet i Skull and Bones
    Man kan inte gå iland var som helst.  ( 7 min )
    Säregna Atomic Heart har fått en strids-trailer
    Det finns många sätt att prygla robotar.  ( 6 min )
    Hogwarts Legacy får ett exklusivt uppdrag på Playstation
    Och den dyraste specialutgåvan verkar också få ett.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Antoine Beaupré: How to nationalize the internet in Canada
    Rogers had a catastrophic failure in July 2022. It affected emergency services (as in: people couldn't call 911, but also some 911 services themselves failed), hospitals (which couldn't access prescriptions), banks and payment systems (as payment terminals stopped working), and regular users as well. The outage lasted almost a full day, and Rogers took days to give any technical explanation on the outage, and even when they did, details were sparse. So far the only detailed account is from outside actors like Cloudflare which seem to point at an internal BGP failure. Its impact on the economy has yet to be measured, but it probably cost millions of dollars in wasted time and possibly lead to life-threatening situations. Apart from holding Rogers (criminally?) responsible for this, what sho…  ( 14 min )
    Jonathan Dowland: Replacement nosecone for Janod Rocket
    My youngest has a cute little wooden Rocket puzzle, made by a French company called Janod. Sadly, at some point, we lost the nose cone part, so I designed and printed a replacement. It's substantially based on one module from an OpenSCAD "Nose Cone Library" by Garrett Goss, which he kindly released to the public domain. I embellished the cone with a top pointy bit and a rounded brim. I also hollowed out the bottom to make space for a magnet. Originally I designed an offset-from-centre slot for the magnet, the idea being, you would insert the magnet off-centre and it would slot into position and be partly held in by the offset, and you could then stick a blob of glue or similar to finish the job. Unfortunately I had a layer shift during the print, so that didn't work. I reamed out a small alcove instead. The white trim is adapted from the lid from some kitchen herbs, trimmed back. I secured the magnet and glued the lid over the bottom. Here it is: rocket.scad. My contributions are under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0).  ( 1 min )
    Dirk Eddelbuettel: RApiSerialize 0.1.2 on CRAN: Small Bugfix
    A new bug fix release 0.1.2 of RApiSerialize got onto CRAN earlier. It follows on the 0.1.1 release from earlier this month, and addresses a minor build issue where an error message, only in the case of missing long vector support, tried to use an i18n macro that is not supplied by the build. The RApiSerialize package is used by both my RcppRedis as well as by Travers excellent qs package. Neither one of us has a need to switch to format 3 yet so format 2 remains the default. But along with other standard updates to package internals, it was straightforward to offer the newer format so that is what we did. Changes in version 0.1.2 (2022-08-25) Correct an error() call (when missing long vector support) to not use i18n macro Courtesy of my CRANberries, there is also a diffstat to the previous version. More details are at the RApiSerialize page; code, issue tickets etc at the GitHub repository. If you like this or other open-source work I do, you can now sponsor me at GitHub. Dirk Eddelbuettel originated on his Thinking inside the box blog. Please report excessive re-aggregation in third-party for-profit settings.  ( 3 min )
  • Open

    NetworkManager 1.40 Released With Multi-Path TCP Support, Other Improvements
    NetworkManager 1.40 has been released as this widely-used software for configuring wired and wireless network interfaces under Linux...  ( 5 min )
    Mir 2.9 Released With XDG-Shell For Wayland, Support For More Protocols
    Canonical has released a new version of Mir, their display server that now focuses on making it easy adapting new environments to use Wayland by being an adaptable Wayland compositor...  ( 4 min )
    Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 Is Eliminating GTK 2 Support
    While we are about three years out from seeing Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10, it was announced today that the GTK2 toolkit will not be supported in that next major RHEL version...  ( 5 min )
    New Intel Patch Series To Further Help Alder Lake / Hybrid CPUs On Linux
    In the year since Intel announced 12th Gen Core "Alder Lake" processors there have been a number of patches tuning the Linux kernel's scheduler and other code to better deal with the mix of the performance and efficient cores. While that looked to be all buttoned up for a number of months now with Alder Lake CPUs performing well on Linux, another patch series further adjusting the Linux sched/fair code was published to help with these Intel hybrid processor designs...  ( 5 min )
    Intel Smooth Sync Support Being Worked On For Linux Graphics Driver
    While Intel GPUs support VESA Adaptive-Sync, for Arc Graphics Intel announced Smooth Sync as what amounts to a dithering filter to make screen tearing less of an issue when not running with vsync enabled or lacking an Adaptive-Sync display...  ( 5 min )
    Facebook Developing THP Shrinker To Avoid Linux Memory Waste
    Meta/Facebook engineers have announced their work on THP Shrinker as a way for Linux's Transparent Hugepages (THP) to be more efficient and avoiding memory waste by removing under-utilized transparent hugepages...  ( 5 min )
    More ASUS ROG Laptop Improvements Queued Ahead Of Linux 6.1
    Thanks to the work of independent developer Luke Jones and as part of his Asusctl Linux project, ASUS laptops continue seeing better feature support on Linux and with the v6.1 cycle kicking off in October are more ASUS ROG laptop enhancements that have been readied...  ( 5 min )
    LibreOffice Working On New Gestures Support
    While LibreOffice has supported some input gestures in the past like swiping and long presses with the GTK front-end as well as some Android and iOS specific additions, it looks like greater gesture support is on the way for this cross-platform, open-source office suite...  ( 5 min )
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    Fredagspanelen 264: RTX 4000 närmar sig, böjbara skärmar och dyrare Playstation 5
    Calle och Jonas trånar efter nya OLED-skärmar och diskuterar Nvidias kommande grafikkortssläpp i veckans panel.  ( 5 min )
    Microsoft: "Xbox-priserna höjs inte"
    Sonys prishöjning får inget gensvar från spelkonsolrivalen Microsoft, som menar att det inte finns några planer på större prislappar.  ( 6 min )
    Valve pratar om framtiden för Steam Deck och Steam OS i ny bok
    I den nya boken pratar Valve om utvecklingsarbetet bakom såväl spelmaskinen Steam Deck som operativsystemet Steam OS och framtiden för plattformen som helhet.  ( 6 min )
    Geforce RTX 4000-serien presenteras den 20 september
    I samband med att Nvidias kvartalsrapport spikas, lovar VD Jensen Huang att berätta mer om den kommande "Ada Lovelace"-serien på GTC 2022.  ( 6 min )
    Lastpass utsatt för dataintrång
    Ett dataintrång har skett hos lösenordshanteraren Lastpass, men enligt bolaget är kundernas uppgifter och lösenord säkra.  ( 6 min )
    VESA sjösätter ny standard för att mäta rörelseoskärpa hos bildskärmar
    Standarden ClearMR ska göra det lättare för konsumenter att ta reda hur tydlig bild bildskärmar kan presentera i rörelse.  ( 6 min )
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    Hopped Up
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    Untitled
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    Comic for 2022.08.26 - Pick a Card
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )
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    Cloud Swirls
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  • Open

    Heroku to delete inactive accounts, shut down free tier
    Move over, GitLab, this purge begins in October Heroku, Saleforce's platform-as-a-service biz, on Thursday said it will discontinue its free container and database offerings, and will purge inactive accounts because of ongoing abuse.…  ( 5 min )
    California to phase out internal combustion vehicles by 2035
    Air board votes unanimously to approve wind down of gas guzzlers There's a popular adage that "as California goes, so goes the nation."…  ( 6 min )
    LastPass source code, blueprints stolen by intruder
    Your passwords are still safe, biz says Internal source code and documents have been stolen from LastPass by a cyber-thief.…  ( 4 min )
    US plans to open up government-funded science research papers to all
    Remembering Aaron Swartz Fourteen years after the late Aaron Swartz published his Guerilla Open Access Manifesto calling for the liberation of publicly funded scientific literature, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy has called for taxpayer-funded research to be made available to the public at no cost.…  ( 5 min )
    China's Baidu enters quantum computing chat with Qian Shi system
    A small but functional quantum system accelerating science, not search Chinese search giant Baidu has unveiled its first quantum computing hardware and software capabilities during the Quantum Create developer conference in Beijing this week.…  ( 5 min )
    Alibaba Cloud launches RISC-V developer platform for edge SoCs
    Says it's already used Wujian 600 to pull up its own SoC China's Alibaba has released a development platform to help engineers building high-performance Systems-on-Chip (SoC) silicon based on the RISC-V open architecture, which is claimed to also include an optimized software stack to help speed product rollout.…  ( 4 min )
    Crooks target top execs on Office 365 with MFA-bypass scheme
    The 'widespread' campaign hunts for multimillion-dollar transactions A business email compromise scheme targeting CEOs and CFOs using Microsoft Office 365 combines phishing with a man-in-the-middle attack to bypass multi-factor authentication.…  ( 5 min )
    Compound that 'remembers' phase transitions could have uses in computer memory
    Researchers ran a current through vanadium dioxide and were never forgiven Researchers in Switzerland have discovered a compound that can "remember" its previous phase transition states, offering potential applications in computer memory and information processing.…  ( 4 min )
    Deepin prepares to leave Debian base and move to fully independent distro
    Big changes are afoot in a forthcoming version, but they're not fully visible yet A leading Chinese Linux vendor is polishing what may be its last Debian-based release, and preparing for the move to becoming a fully independent distro with its own new package format, Linglong.…  ( 6 min )
    Twitter, Meta kill hundreds of pro-Western troll accounts
    It turns out online chicanery aiming to destabilize foreign nations is a two-way street Well known for an abundance of anti-western troll accounts and propaganda, Twitter and Meta are reporting that they've taken down nearly 200 accounts that, for the past five years, have been amplifying pro-Western messages in the Middle East and Central Asia.…  ( 5 min )
    Nvidia will unveil next-gen GPU architecture in September
    But graphics giant foresees revenues falling even further in the next quarter as gamer GPU sales drop Graphics giant Nvidia plans to unveil the architecture for its next-generation consumer GPU, Lovelace, at its GTC conference in September, CEO Jensen Huang has said.…  ( 5 min )
    Twitter whistleblower summoned to Senate Judiciary Committee
    Get the popcorn out for September 13 Former head of security at Twitter and whistleblower Peiter "Mudge" Zatko is scheduled to appear before the US Senate Judiciary Committee on September 13 to discuss allegations that his former employer made serious failures in protecting user data.…  ( 5 min )
    Deals are being 'inspected by higher levels of management,' says Salesforce
    Customers 'more measured', and this will continue, says CRM giant, but Snowflake lifts forecasts Salesforce said last night it was seeing sales cycles getting stretched and was taking a "very deliberate" approach on hiring and described caution from buyers after it missed analysts' expectations for revenue growth in the coming months.…  ( 5 min )
    DeFi credit scores: Coming soon to a blockchain near you
    Tension between anonymity and identity in web3 is being tested as firms seek a way to control rampant fraud Web3, blockchain, and decentralized finance (DeFi) technologies, with their famously libertarian users, seem like the last places you'd expect to see a credit-scoring system. But money talks, even in a DeFi world.…  ( 5 min )
    China's Chongqing manufacturing hub extends factory power cuts indefinitely
    PC component manufacturers won't get priority as area faces fires and heatwaves Officials from the manufacturing hub of Chongqing notified factories on Wednesday that mandated power cuts in the municipality were extended until further notice, affecting both PC and Apple suppliers.…  ( 5 min )
    Shout-out to whoever went to Black Hat with North Korean malware on their PC
    I am the one who NOCs The folks tasked with defending the Black Hat conference network see a lot of weird, sometimes hostile activity, and this year it included malware linked to Kim Jong-un's agents.…  ( 6 min )
    UK's NHS goes to market for $2b HR and payroll system
    Plans afoot to replace Oracle EBS/AIX system used by 1.8 million staff dating from 2008 The UK's National Health Service (NHS) is in the market for a company to manage HR and a new electronic staff records system as part of a procurement worth up to £1.7 billion ($2 billion).…  ( 5 min )
    Meet the CrowPi-L – a clever, slightly rustic, Raspberry Pi laptop chassis
    Mobilises the Pi nicely but also frustrates in a few ways Desktop Tourism  The Raspberry Pi is rightly celebrated as a very clever feat of design. But I've always found Pi-based machines hard to work with because connecting a Pi to the peripherals needed to make it useful creates a tangle of wires.…  ( 6 min )
    How archaeologists can use AI to date our ancestors
    Human remains from millennia ago analyzed by the machines their descendants built AI algorithms can be used to date ancient human remains by analyzing their DNA, just-published research has proposed.…  ( 6 min )
    Xiaomi could be 'adversely affected' by tax allegations in India
    India wants low-end Chinese smartphones out – and its efforts may be working Chinese gadget giant Xiaomi has warned in its April-June 2022 earnings report that its troubles in India – related to allegations of improperly moving funds offshore – could noticeably affect business.…  ( 4 min )
    Bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange Voyager to pay $1.6m bonus to key staff
    Frozen firm has yet to return all funds to netizens More than 30 employees at the bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange Voyager will receive $1.6 million in bonus pay as the company scrambles to return customers' funds frozen on its platform. …  ( 5 min )
    Block sued after ex-staffer siphons customer data
    'Don't be such a Square' hits different these days Block – the digital payments giant formerly known as Square – faces allegations it failed to take adequate measures to protect customers' personal information.…  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Microsoft Won't Drive Up Xbox Pricing Amidst PS5 Price Hike
    For now, Microsoft has no plans to increase Xbox Series X|S prices.  ( 60 min )
    Samsung To Keep Using AMD's RDNA GPUs For Exynos SoCs
    Despite mediocre results, Samsung plans to continue using AMD's RDNA architectures for own iGPUs.  ( 59 min )
    GPD Win 4 Gets Significant CPU Upgrade Plus Hall Sensor Analog Sticks
    The yet to be officially announced GPD Win 4 is expected to come with the muscular AMD Ryzen 7 6800U, upgraded hall effect thumbsticks, a new physical slider keyboard, and more.  ( 59 min )
    Maker's Raspberry Pi Apple Hack is an Instant Classic
    A blend of classic Apple and modern Raspberry Pi lies at the heart of this DIY build from maker Dave Luna.  ( 63 min )
    AMD Set to Become TSMC's Second Largest Customer for 5 nm Products
    As AMD is ramping up production of its next-generation CPUs and GPUs, it is set to become the second largest client of TSMC's N5 node.  ( 60 min )
    AMD Ryzen 7 7700X 32% Faster Than 5800X in Unverified Cinebench Test
    An AMD Ryzen 7 7700X Engineering Sample has been benchmarked in an unverified leak.  ( 59 min )
    Linux Kernel 6.1 Introduces Faulty CPU Core Detection Logging Feature
    A upcoming Linux kernel update is adding a new CPU core error detection logger, to track and record faulty CPUs in Linux-based systems.  ( 58 min )
    Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W Powers 'Octapod' Portable Music Player
    Maker Anil, aka one_free_man_, has created an open-source portable handheld that runs DietPi and works as a music player.  ( 62 min )
    OKdo To Manufacture Raspberry Pi Rockchip Powered Alternative
    A partnership between OKdo and Radxa means Rock boards should be easier to source.  ( 59 min )
    Corsair Reveals Bendable OLED Ultrawide Gaming Monitor
    Corsair reveals brand new ultrawide monitor that can bend from a flat display into a curved display.  ( 59 min )
    Sony Hikes PlayStation 5 Price in Nearly All Regions
    Sony increases PS5 price everywhere except for the U.S. due to global economic environment.  ( 59 min )
    WD Black SN850X SSD Review: Back in Black
    We put the WD Black SN850X through the wringer to see if it lives up to the company's performance claims.  ( 66 min )
    Nvidia's Revenue Drops as Ada Lovelace Looms and Hopper Enters Production
    Macro weakness and seasonality drive Nvidia's revenue and profits down, but the company still earns billions.  ( 62 min )
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    Microsoft responds to PlayStation 5 price hike news
    Following Sony's announcement that it will be raising the price of PlayStation 5 in select countries, Microsoft has responded to the news, merely noting that existing Xbox Series X/S prices remain the same. Sony announced it would be increasing the cost of PlayStation 5 - in response to "high global inflation rates, as well as adverse currency trends" - earlier today, with the price hike impacting most markets around the world, effective immediately. That increase affects both the disc and disc-less models of PS5, and equates to £30 in the UK and €50 in Europe - with similar bumps occurring in Japan, China, Australia, Mexico, and Canada, but not the US for the time being. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Netflix's live-action BioShock movie will be helmed by I Am Legend director
    Following Netflix's announcement earlier this year that it's adapting Irrational Games' acclaimed shooter BioShock into a live-action film, the streaming service has revealed it's now secured a writer and director for the project. When word of the BioShock adaptation first broke in February, there was little to go on beyond the fact it was being developed alongside publisher Take-Two and Vertigo Entertainment with an eye on turning it into a cinematic universe. Now, though, Netflix has revealed that two key roles on the project have now been filled, with Francis Lawrence having signed on in the director role. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Flaming Espinas joins Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak in next free update
    It's only been a couple of weeks since Capcom dropped the first free title update for Monster Hunter Rise's Sunbreak expansion, but already the publisher is teasing Update 2, with a first look at incoming new monster variant Flaming Espinas. Espinas returned to the Monster Hunter series back in August with the launch of Rise's Sunbreak expansion, marking the first time the creature had made the roster in a new game since its debut in 2008's Monster Hunter Frontier 2.0. In its base form, Espinas is a Flying Wyvern capable of paralysis, poison, and fireblight, and while Capcom is yet to reveal how Title Update 2's new Flaming Espinas variant will differ, there's a look at the creature in the publisher's newly revealed teaser trailer below. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Shadow of the Tomb Raider is free on the Epic Games Store next week
    Anyone with a hankering for some glum action-adventuring should keep an eye on the Epic Games Store next, when Shadow of the Tomb Raider - the final instalment in Square Enix's gloomy rebooted series - will be free to download, alongside Submerged: Hidden Depths. Shadow of the Tomb Raider, if you're unfamiliar, picks up its narrative around a year after the events of 2015's Rise of the Tomb Raider, following young Lara Croft as she races through the Peruvian jungle in a bid to stop a Mayan apocalypse. "This is a well-crafted and polished experience," Eurogamer's Aoife Wilson wrote in her Shadow of the Tomb Raider review in 2018, "and when [it] actually gives you full control and leaves you alone to seek out its quieter mysteries, it can render you wide-eyed with wonder". Read more  ( 15 min )
    I was a Teenage Exocolonist explores the hidden mechanics of memory
    I can't work out whether there are an unusual number of games concerned with memory being released this year, or if I'm just at the right moment in my life to notice them all. Anyway, to add to Hindsight and Arcade Paradise, here's another. I Was a Teenage Exocolonist is the story of a child growing up amongst a group of people who are trying to make a new life on a distant planet. If you put the science fiction elements aside, though, it's a game that explores the many ways in which our past experiences shape us. In other words, it's a game about memory. It's a systems-heavy game, but as I've been playing the last few days I've been trying to look through that layer to get at the things I suspect the game truly seems to want me to see. In Exocolonist, you take your child from the age of ten up until they're twenty. That's it. But that's also quite a lot, because I'm not sure there's a decade more packed with foundational events than the years between your tenth birthday and your twentieth. Exocolonist takes things slowly, too, with the rhythm of the game locked to the changing seasons of the planet you're trying to make a life on. This is lovely, atmospheric stuff, as Quiet gives way to Pollen, and it's neatly functional too. Each month you wander around the base, talk to the adults and any kids who are growing up alongside you, and you choose a single task to do. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Battlefield 2042's Season Two is a return to form
    More than two months on from the release of Battlefield 2042's Season One - which was generally well received - the game's next season finally kicks off at the end of this month, on 30th August. The content drop is familiar too, with Season Two containing just one new map, a new specialist, a couple of new vehicles and some new weapons. Despite the snail's pace in which DICE is moving to improve the game since its disastrous launch last year, the new content looks promising, and most importantly feels up to the standard we used to expect from the DICE of yesteryear. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Microsoft Flight Simulator 40th Anniversary Edition details have landed
    More details about the 40th Anniversary Edition of Microsoft Flight Simulator have been released to celebrate the return of Gamescom. Previously, a few of the aircraft to appear in it were confirmed for the special edition during the Xbox Showcase back in June. Meanwhile, the game's first ever city update, available from today, is detailed in an Xbox blog. Five German photogrammetry cities have been added to the game: Hanover, Dortmund, Dusseldorf, Bonn and Cologne. Players can download the update for free from the game's marketplace and take in the sights of Germany from the air. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Umbrella Academy executive producer developing Netflix's Horizon Zero Dawn show
    Sony revealed its plans to adapt Horizon Zero Dawn for TV back in May. Now, it has been announced that Steve Blackman, who is the showrunner for The Umbrella Academy (as well as working on the currently in development ISS drama Orbital) will be responsible for this upcoming adaptation (via Deadline). Blackman spoke of his enthusiasm for the Netflix project, calling Guerrilla's Horizon Zero Dawn an "exceptionally well-crafted game with wonderful characters not often seen in the rank-and-file of the gaming world." Read more  ( 15 min )
    Nvidia blames "challenging market conditions" for Q3 forecast misses
    Graphics card maker Nvidia is also feeling the sting of the current economic climate. Its recent financial report revealed the company fell short of Wall Street's Q3 expectations, blaming "challenging market conditions" for this setback (via CNBC). Two weeks ago, Nvidia predicted it would not meet Wall Street's finacial estimates, commenting that it had seen a significant slow down in growth driven by "disappointing" sales. At this time, Nvidia also stated it would see a decline in its gross margin. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Supermassive Games pays homage to classic slasher horror in The Devil In Me
    Ahead of its appearance at Gamescom, Eurogamer was given the chance to watch a pre-prepared keynote on The Devil In Me, the next instalment and first season finale of Supermassive Games’ The Dark Pictures Anthology. The preview, hosted by director Tom Heaton, included footage from one of the episode’s later scenes, and a look at its various gameplay improvements. This early look began by introducing the story and main characters of The Devil In Me, and setting up its stakes. Supermassive’s latest horror chapter centres on Lonnit Entertainment, a small TV production company developing a documentary series on famous serial killers, and a gentleman named Granthem Du'Met, who inherited a hotel with reproductions of rooms from HH Holmes' infamous “Murder Castle”. Once the team arrives to meet Du'Met, however, it's clear the hotel is a much more accurate reproduction than they previously realised. Kate Wilder, played by Jessie Buckley, stars as the show's presenter. In our preview she was described as introverted and lacking self-confidence, but with a fierce determination to do the right thing. Heaton later told me that Wilder was "quite damaged" when I asked more about the character. "She's carrying this secret most of the people on the crew don't know about at all," he said, and added that she could sometimes snap at people while attempting to process issues from the past. Read more  ( 21 min )
    Here's Amazon Prime Gaming's September line-up
    Amazon has just announced its September line-up for Prime Gaming members. September's games are: Assassin's Creed Origins, Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor Game of the Year Edition, Football Manager 2022, The Dig, Defend the Rook, We. The Revolution, Castle on the Coast, and Word of the Law: Death Mask Collector's Edition. Amazon has additionally teamed up with Ubisoft to offer more in-game content for Ubisoft titles, including Skull and Bones, Rainbow Six Siege and Assassin's Creed Valhalla. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Sony reluctantly raises PS5 price, but knows it can get away with it
    Sony has announced a shock price rise for the PlayStation 5, and in a Eurogamer Newscast special, we're here to discuss why the company has pulled this undoubtedly unpopular move - and why it's likely to get away with it. Will Sony sell fewer PS5s as a result? It seems unlikely. But it's more pressure on PlayStation, which has already had to defend its £70/$70 price point for games - including the upcoming The Last of Us: Part 1 remaster - and just this week announced an expensive-looking new PlayStation 5 controller. At a time when all of us are looking at our bank balance's bottom line, an extra £30 to buy a PS5 marks not just an unprecedented decision by Sony, but a troubling sign of the times. Will Microsoft now feel emboldened to follow suit, or soak up any extra costs as a point of difference? Tom Phillips, Ed Nightingale, Victoria Kennedy and Ishraq Subhan discuss. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Crypt of the NecroDancer gets standalone rhythm game spin-off
    Crypt of the NecroDancer is getting a new standalone rhythm game spin-off. Last month developer Brace Yourself Games updated its game for the first time in five years and teased that something new was on the way. And now we know: Rift of the NecroDancer, available to wishlist now on Steam. Read more  ( 15 min )
    PlayStation 5 tournaments to get open beta
    Tournaments - a feature of the PlayStation 4 since 2016 - will finally be available to try on PS5 soon via a public beta. Sony has announced an "all-new on-console tournament experience" coming to PS5 "in the coming weeks, in select countries" - and you can see some of its new look just above. When implemented, the feature will allow you to join competitions for prizes and leaderboard bragging rights, with easy access from the PS5 Control Center and Game Hub. Read more  ( 14 min )
    PlayStation VR2 playable at Tokyo Game Show via Resident Evil Village
    Capcom has announced that Resident Evil Village for PlayStation VR 2 will be playable at Tokyo Game Show this year - the first time Sony's new headset will be available to try publicly. The VR mode for Village, available only on PS5, was first announced during Sony's State of Play showcase in June. Capcom had already announced it will be at Tokyo Game Show, but it's now revealed that a demo for Village on PlayStation VR 2 will be there next month. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Japanese Sonic Frontiers players receive special V-Tuber DLC costumes
    Lucky Sonic Frontiers players in Japan will receive special V-Tuber DLC costumes. Sega has revealed a collaboration with Hololive VTuber Inugami Korone, which changes Sonic's glove and shoe designs as well as the appearance of the in-game mascot Coco. The DLC was posted on reddit, though it's unclear if this will also feature elsewhere. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Steam hosts Ukrainian Games Festival to mark country's independence day
    The Ukrainian Games Festival is currently being hosted on Steam. This festival is being presented by Indie Cup, with the support of the Ukrainian Indie Developers community. Here, you will find broadcasts for a variety of games made by Ukrainian developers, as well as deals on titles such as The Testament of Sherlock Holmes by Frogwares and Stalker: Shadow of Chernobyl by GSC Games World. Read more  ( 15 min )
    eFootball 2023 out today, with AC Milan and Inter in tow
    Konami has released eFootball 2023 across PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X and S, PC and mobile. eFootball's second year kicks off as an update to the existing free-to-play game, with the summer's transfers reflected in team lineups. eFootball 2023 sees the return of officially-licensed Italian clubs AC Milan and Inter, as well as the addition of Liga BBVA MX, which brings all 18 Mexican clubs, their players and the Estadio Azteca to the game. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Looks like Square Enix is opening a new studio in the west
    Square Enix may be opening a new studio in the west, shortly after selling its previous western studios to Embracer. Studio Onoma is part of an application on the Canadian Trademarks Database, with the applicant Square Enix Newco. According to the application, Studio Onoma will both develop and publish video game software, in addition to working on merchandise like strategy guides, posters, clothing, toys, and action figures. Read more  ( 14 min )
    The new Fear Effect is a third-person cover shooter
    Fear Effect Reinvented just re-emerged with its first gameplay trailer - and the promise of a release date sooner than we think. The video below shows off how different this new Fear Effect looks and plays compared to the originals. Square Enix announced Fear Effect Reinvented back in 2017 with a release window of 2018. Obviously that sailed by. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Dark Souls 3 servers are finally back online
    FromSoftware has finally managed to get Dark Souls 3 back online, seven months after PC PvP servers had to be shut down. Back in January, PC servers for all Dark Souls games were shuttered due to security issues - and remained down for months. In July, at the 183 day mark, there were signs that Dark Souls 3 could be back online soon - but still no fix. Now, at well over 200 days, the PC servers for Dark Souls 3 are now live again. Rejoice! Read more  ( 15 min )
    Halo Infinite - these aren’t teething problems anymore
    Halo Infinite isn't in the Top 10 of most-played Steam games. In fact, at a little more than six months old - and its fan-favourite multiplayer component entirely free-to-play and available on Steam - Halo Infinite doesn't even breach the top 50 games that boast the highest concurrent player numbers. Or the top 100. At the time of writing, Halo Infinite ranks as the 286th "top game" according to Steam Charts. It bounces up and down around the chart, of course - the highest I saw it hit yesterday was 255th, I think? - but in the last 30 days, its peak concurrent PC count hasn't even breached 8000 players, even though, at its height last November, it boasted over a quarter of a million. According to the same tracker site, Infinite's lacklustre peak concurrent count is down 50 percent compared to last month alone. And that's a problem. Before you start drafting your angry retort in the comments: yes, I know, concurrent player counts are far from the only metric we can use to measure a game's success, especially when that game has for many, many years been a console exclusive. It is, however, perhaps a symptom of Halo Infinite's chronic malaise and indicative of an unhappy player base. Read more  ( 19 min )
    PlayStation 5 price increase announced, by £30 in UK
    Sony has increased the PlayStation 5 price, effective immediately, in most markets around the world. The console's price will rise by £30 in the UK and €50 in Europe, to £480/€550, or £390/€450 for the console's disc-less digital version. Elsewhere around the world, Japan, China, Australia, Mexico and Canada will also see price rises. But the US will not see a price rise at this time. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Here's ten minutes of new Forspoken gameplay footage
    Following a not exactly inspiring showing earlier this month, Square Enix has once again reached deep into its Forspokeon promotional sack, this time pulling out a ten-minute trailer showcasing new gameplay from its upcoming open-world fantasy adventure. Forspoken casts players in the role of Frey Holland - played by Ella Balinska - an "ordinary young woman who must harness her magical abilities to survive" in a "beautiful yet cruel" world of Athia. We get a much better closer at that world in Square's latest trailer, which includes a glimpse of the city of Cipal, Athia's only safe haven, where refugees gather to escape the corrupting force of the Break. Here, players can speak to citizens to take on quests and trade before heading out to explore Athia's more dangerous regions, including Praenost - a barren desert where the only signs of life are corrupted enemies - and the lush region of Avoalet with its dangerously mutated beasts. Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    AMD's Radeon RX 6700 graphics card is down to just £300 at Overclockers
    The AMD RX 6700 is retailing for £300 right now, a great price for a strong 1440p graphics card with support for hardware-accelerated ray tracing and FSR 2.0. The card in question is a PowerColor Fighter model, with a simple two-fan design that should be more than capable of dealing with this mid-range card's modest 175W TDP. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Skull And Bones will support 4K, ray tracing, and uncapped FPS on PC
    If there was any PC graphics option I could choose to tweak in real life, it would be "Clutter". My flat forever has it set to Very High, but Skull And Bones will let PC players cycle it down to Low with only a few clicks. It's one of many options highlighted in the "PC features" trailer, which also highlights 4K HDR, ultrawide monitor support, ray tracing and other graphical wizardry available in Ubisoft's pirate 'em up. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Get the 42-inch or 48-inch LG C2 OLED for £999
    The LG C2 OLED probably isn't your first thought when you're considering a new desktop monitor, but its incredible image quality and new smaller 42-inch or 48-inc sizes make it a surprisingly valid choice. Right now you can pick up this monitor in either size for under £1000, depending on where you shop, a price that puts it make more affordable than smaller monitors with worse HDR performance - and that makes it well worth considering. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Rift Of The NecroDancer crosses Guitar Hero and boss battles
    Rift Of The NecroDancer was teased just a couple of weeks ago at the end of a trailer for the newest Crypt Of The NecroDancer expansion. At the time, there was no info other than a logo, but as of yesterday there's a full reveal trailer. We now know that Rift Of The NecroDancer is a standalone rhythm game, akin to Guitar Hero with combat. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Tower Of Fantasy has already teased its first major update, which adds a cyberpunk city
    One of the advantages to games heading westward long after an initial release in Asia is that there's sometimes a stack of existing update content already waiting to be localised. Perhaps that's how Tower Of Fantasy, which released two weeks ago, is already teasing its first piece of additional content. Find a trailer for it below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Great War: Western Front aims to capture WW1’s brutal battles of attrition
    Not that all the other wars were just a bit of goofing around, but World War One – a conflict remembered more for its bleak, arduous trench warfare than any great triumph over evil – seems like a particularly unusual source of inspiration for a strategy game that will, presumably, be played for fun. Nonetheless, The Great War: Western Front, a combination of macro planning and tactical RTS battling revealed this week at Gamescom, has elected to lean right into WW1’s complexities and difficulties rather than dance around them. Developers Petroglyph have gone for historical accuracy in various ways, senior designer Chris Becker and audio director Frank Klepacki explain to me at a hands-off demo in Cologne. The soundtrack will even include licensed music from the era. But something they want to really hammer home is the brutality of the war: territory won’t be won in heroic pushes but slowly and bloodily, while collapsing morale is as much a danger as any advancing army. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Puzzle game OU dreams of being a modern spin on The Neverending Story
    Nostalgic yet unknown is perhaps a good way to describe OU upon first glance. It’s a game clearly designed to mimic the picture book imagination of childhood with its hand-drawn visuals and the innocent silent presence of its protagonist, a young boy named OU and his opossum friend. Even its music is reminiscent of some lost, unknown childhood as we’re lulled into the strange world of U-Chronia with the smooth instrumentation of a single guitar and its occasional percussion. Yet it’s clear with the presence of beasts that threaten your safety and a shadowy clone that this isn’t some peaceful retreat into childhood. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Spaceship witch shooter Chorus is worth sticking with on Game Pass
    Being told "You have to power through the boring bit until it livens up" often makes me go find something else, but it's worth it with Chorus. The singleplayer spaceship shooter hit Game Pass in June, and all you need to know is: once you power through the boring bit, you get to play as a spacewitch pilot who fights with guns and magic while weaving through the innards of battleships and megastructures. It's one of those good 7/10 games. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Fly over Gamescom in Microsoft Flight Simulator’s first City Update, out now
    Make-believe plane pretender Microsoft Flight Simulator’s first City Update has added realistic versions of five German conurbations just in time to mark Gamescom 2022. You can now fly over Hanover, Dortmund, Dusseldorf, Bonn and Cologne. They’re rendered with the fancy photogrammetry technique that’s already plonked hundred of cities into Flight Simulator’s rendition of Earth. That means that you can zoom over Koelnmesse, which is where Gamescom’s happening right bloomin’ now. Nice bit of Inception-style weirdness there, Microsoft Flight Simulator devs. I’ll give it a go later and see if I can spot our roving reporter Ed. Witness the realism for yourself by watching the trailer below, like some kind of human aircraft gliding above. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Elite Dangerous uses real-life space sounds recorded from Antarctica
    Sci-fi space flight sim Elite Dangerous’ director has owned up that the game uses noise from recordings of actual space. David Braben said that Frontier Developments incorporate audio from projects such as the British Antactic Survey’s Halley Research Station, which is where the data was collected that revealed that classic environmental disaster, the hole in the ozone layer. Braben’s revelation was prompted by the recent public acknowledgement from NASA that, yes, people really can hear screams in space. Sort of. Read more  ( 17 min )
    The Electronic Wireless Show episode 199: the most meaningful moral quandaries special
    This week on The Electronic Wireless Show podcast we give thanks to listener Tom Fakelastname, who emailed in to ask us about the moral quandaries in video games that we feel are the most meaningful. Matthew isn't here this week, which means we are very well behaved. I talk about BioWare games a normal amount, and Nate tries (and, in fairness, succeeds) to find a way to make moral choices a thing that you can apply to the sort of games he likes. Not Age Of Empires II this time, though. Because there's no Matthew, I change the Cavern Of Lies into a cavern of moral judgement for Nate, and make him run a gauntlet of some of the most important choices in Dragon Age Inquisition with no context. He turns out to be both authoritarian and kind of wholesome as an Inquisitor. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Atlas Fallen's action RPG combat looks truly delicious in motion
    Revealed at Gamescom Opening Night Live, Atlas Fallen is an upcoming action RPG being developed by Deck 13 Interactive, the folks behind The Surge games. It's eschewing the robotic antics of its predecessor in favour of a Middle Eastern-inspired semi-open world filled with towering blocks of sand, rolling dunes, and mahoosive beasties. I managed to see a brief 30-minute presentation of the game here at Gamescom, which gave off the impression that it's shaping up to satisfy those craving a AA title to plonk on their shelf. I've got to say that in action that combat really looks good, too. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Steam Deck reservations are at their highest since launch
    Valve have revealed that daily reservations of the Steam Deck are higher than at any time since the handheld launched in February this year. The official Steam Deck Twitter account shared the coy stats in a tweet but, as ever, neglected to go into detail about just how many are being snapped up. Good job they’re pumping out more Decks than even Valve expected, at least. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Devil In Me is mixing Saw, The Shining, and "really horrible" murders with a dash of true crime
    "The thing we're doing with The Dark Pictures is exploring different sub genres of horror," explains game director Tom Heaton. The Dark Pictures Anthology is, well, a horror anthology, each a compact standalone scary game where you explore and deal with QTEs and hazardous choices, in the vein of Supermassive's smash hit Until Dawn. The idea, says Heaton, is that each one takes one or two horror sub-genres and mines them, maybe subverting the tropes here and there. Up next is The Devil In Me, inspired by the infamous Chicago serial killer H. H. Holmes. "What I think we decided with The Dark Pictures games early on was that the next game in the series would be very different from the last game, because we want to keep it fresh, we want to give the audience new," Heaton explains. So, after a zombie ghost ship in Man Of Medan, the psychological witch hauntings in Little Hope, and military squad vs. vampire aliens in House Of Ashes, Heaton pitches The Devil In Me as kind of Saw meets The Shining. It's a serial killer slasher in a weirdo hotel, and it has a true crime element. And I have to say, it's probably the most excited I've been for a Dark Pictures entry. Read more  ( 21 min )
    Dead Pets Unleashed is a chaotic punk rock drama that’s giving me quarter-life crisis flashbacks
    A slice-of-life game about a demon punk rock band having a quarter-life crisis? Dead Pets Unleashed looks exactly like my cup of tea, or rather, a fizzling concoction of Red Bull, battery acid, and popping candy. After launching a Kickstarter campaign, developers Triple Topping have released a Dead Pets Unleashed demo, so players can get a taste of the highs and lows of band life and, after playing the demo myself, it’s definitely worth checking out. You'll wanna turn your speakers up for this one. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Everywhere devs respond to NFT speculation, saying it's built “on Unreal Engine 5, not the blockchain”
    The mysterious Everywhere was one of the most baffling game reveals of Gamescom Opening Night Live this year, and while the words 'metaverse', 'NFTs' and 'blockchain' weren't anywhere to be seen during Tuesday's showcase, it certainly sounded like it had something to do with at least one of them. Now, after the internet noticed the studio is currently hiring for three positions to form a “blockchain team”, developer Build A Rocket Boy have responded to the claims on Reddit. And the answer is... complicated. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Dark Souls 3’s PC servers are back online after seven months of downtime
    Elden Ring devs FromSoftware have restored the PC multiplayer servers for Dark Souls 3, the studio has announced today. Servers were disabled for all Dark Souls games in January following the discovery of a security vulnerability that could affect anyone playing Dark Souls 3 online. Today’s restoration marks the first step in getting multiplayer back on track for the series on PC. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Warhammer 40K Darktide is a perfect team-bonding exercise with weighty weapons
    Feeling proud is a nice sensation isn't it? I've felt proud a number of times at this year's Gamescom so far, marked first by an excellent McDonald's choice (honey crisp chicken and bacon) on the first evening, followed by a doner kebab that put it to shame. And in a non-savoury twist, today it was being a member of the first squad to complete the Warhammer 40K: Darktide demo mission – the sweetest feeling of them all, and a perfect team-bonding exercise. The bonus emotions? Surprise and... not being so surprised. Surprise that we'd accomplished such a feat, but not so much surprise in the game itself. It was, as expected, a good co-op FPS time! But a very familiar one. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Samsung’s 990 Pro SSD promises fastest-ever PCIe 4.0 read speeds
    Unnervingly tall gaming monitors aren’t Samsung’s only hardware to get a Gamescom showing. Last night also saw the reveal of the Samsung 990 Pro SSD, a premium designed-for-gaming drive with read speeds up to 7450MB/s – nudging the theoretical limits of its PCIe 4.0 interface. If it actually reaches such speeds in the wild, once it launches in October, that would make it the fastest consumer PCIe 4.0 drive yet. And write speeds aren’t far behind either, at up to 6900MB/s. Read more  ( 17 min )
  • Open

    US government to make all research it funds open access on publication
    Policy will go into effect in 2026, apply to everything that gets federal money.  ( 7 min )
    Scientists explore chemistry of tattoo inks amid growing safety concerns
    “Every time we looked at one of the inks, we found something that gave me pause.”  ( 6 min )
    Phishers who hit Twilio and Cloudflare stole 10k credentials from 136 others
    Already regarded among the most advanced, the attacks were also done at a massive scale.  ( 6 min )
    Google’s Fuchsia OS is taking over smart displays, now on its second device
    The quiet rollout of Google's secretive OS continues, but don't expect any changes.  ( 6 min )
    The GPU shortage is over. The GPU surplus has arrived!
    In 2021, it was nearly impossible to buy a GPU for a decent price. Not anymore.  ( 5 min )
    Two swatting attempts on Marjorie Taylor Greene used bog-standard tech
    One was an "attempted swatting." The other was a "false report of a crime."  ( 6 min )
    DuckDuckGo now offers anti-tracking email service to everyone
    They're totally cool with you giving their emails out to spammy companies.  ( 5 min )
    California calls time on internal combustion engines from 2035
    In the face of federal inaction, the Golden State acts.  ( 5 min )
    Amazon to close US telehealth service as it shifts sector ambitions
    Tech group has other ideas to gain foothold in $4 trillion health care market.  ( 6 min )
    Sony raises PlayStation 5 console prices in many regions, effective immediately
    United States escapes the price hike, which ranges between 3-13% around the world.  ( 6 min )
    HP’s new Thunderbolt 4 monitor uses contrast-rich IPS Black tech
    An option for power workers seeking deeper contrast without Mini LED or OLED prices.  ( 5 min )
    HP’s 5K ultrawide all-in-one has workhorse specs, dual magnetic webcams
    There's a gimmick or two, but it's also one of the highest-specced AIOs around.  ( 6 min )
    What to expect from Apple’s September 7 “Far Out” event
    New iPhones and Watches: you bet. New Macs and iPads? Probably not.  ( 6 min )
    Former NASA official on trying to stop SLS: “There was just such visible hostility”
    "I still don't know to this day if my boss, Charlie, was in on the whole deal."  ( 7 min )
    Dr. Oz emailed Trump admin. to push notoriously useless COVID treatment
    The celebrity doctor played an early role in the push for an ineffective drug.  ( 6 min )
    “Spanish Stonehenge” emerges from watery grave for second time in last 3 years
    The Dolmen of Guadalperal dates back to between 2000 and 3000 BCE.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Skull and Bones: PC specs, features, and anti-cheat software detailed
    Ubisoft has provided information on the PC specs, anti-cheat software, and server status for its upcoming pirate game, Skull and Bones. The game will feature 4K HDR, uncapped fps to help reduce input lag during naval battles, image upscaling through ray tracing, DLSS and FSR, and advanced input settings. While you can play the game alone, you may want to sail the high seas with others. To that end, Ubisoft has implemented a matchmaking system that places you into servers based on your Infamy level and PvP preference. You can also report or block others for disruptive behavior. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Microsoft Flight Simulator City Update focuses on Germany, 40th Anniversary Update to add gliders, helicopters
    Microsoft Flight Simulator will receive a 40th Anniversary Update in November that will add helicopters, gliders, the Airbus A-310, and seven famous historical aircraft. Set to release on November 11, the update will include four classic commercial airports, ten glider airports, 12 new aircraft, 14 heliports, 20 classic missions from the franchise’s past, and more. The classic aircraft you can expect are: the 1903 Wright Flyer, the 1915 Curtiss JN-4 Jenny, the 1927 Ryan NYP Spirit of St. Louis, the 1935 Douglas DC-3, the beautiful 1937 Grumman G-21 Goose, the 1947 Havilland DHC-2 Beaver, and the famous 1947 Hughes H-4 Hercules, also known as the Spruce Goose. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The Last Case of Benedict Fox videos go deep into the secrets of the Mansion, introduce you to the Tattooist
    The Last Case of Benedict Fox is a Lovecraftian Metroidvania with lovely hand-crafted visuals which seem to fit perfectly with the twisted world of the game. As self-proclaimed detective Benedict Fox, you will have to sort your way through a world of secret organizations, forbidden rituals, and cold-blooded murders. To find clues to untimely deaths, you will dive into the victims’ consciousness to explore their memories. You won't be going it alone, as you will have a companion along for the ride. Unlike a typical sidekick or a Dr. Watson, your ally is a demon to which you are bound. It is this demon that allows you to explore the minds of the recently deceased to get a “testimony.” Read more  ( 16 min )
    Assassin’s Creed Origins, Football Manager 2022, more coming to Prime Gaming in September
    Amazon has announced the eight Prime Gaming titles members can claim during September, and Assassin’s Creed: Origin leads the lot. This month’s lineup not only has you scaling Egyptian pyramids but controlling football clubs from around the world, brawling your way through Mordor, battling hordes, and more. Along with Assassin’s Creed Origins, you will be able to claim Football Manager 2022, Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor Game of the Year Edition, and Defend the Rook. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Battlefield 2042 Season Two releases next week, bringing with it some much needed new content
    EA and DICE have announced all remaining details about the second season of Battlefield 2042. Dubbed Master of Arms, the new season arrives Tuesday, August 30 on all platforms. If you've been keeping with the goings-on in Battlefield 2042, you won't be surprised to learn that Season 2 is bringing a similar amount of new content to the game as we'd seen with Season 1. Like Zero Hour, Master of Arms adds one new map, a new Specialist, three new weapons, and two vehicles. Taking it from the top, the new map is called Stranded, and it takes place in Panama in a drained lake. Similar to last season, the map also emphasises close-quarter combat. Objectives are tightly spread in the deserty environment, but there's an even more CQC-oriented area in the inside of a beached tanker. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Marauders is a sci-fi survival FPS with space scavenging and spaceship dogfights
    One of the briefer — but nonetheless exciting — games shown off during Gamescom early this week was Marauders. This multiplayer survival looter FPS has you venture out into space to scavenge for supplies, fending off other players as you try your best to make off with a nice haul. Releasing into Steam Early Access in October 2022, players keen to jump in even earlier can take part in a series of technical tests during September between September 6-14. More information on these tests will be present on the official Marauders developer blog. Narrative-wise, it’s got an interesting premise. The game is set in an alternative 1980s where World War 1 never ended. As a result the world has been over-industrialised to near destruction, forcing some to venture out to space as a better alternative to the war-torn world below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Devil in Me game director on creating impactful horror, serial killers, and The Dark Pictures Anthology
    When a group of keen filmmakers is adamant on securing the second season of their true-crime show, the finale of their first season needs to go out with a bang. The issue, however, is that they’re creatively bankrupt, until a mysterious architect approaches them with an irresistible offer. The Devil in Me, releasing this autumn from Supermassive Games, follows the crew as they investigate the crimes of notorious serial killer, H. H. Holmes, over a century later. The Devil in Me takes you to a brand-new location with an all-new cast, then takes inspiration from of the most infamous serial killers of all time, and introduces new gameplay mechanics to boot. It seems that any fan of Dark Pictures or even true crime is undoubtedly going to enjoy the game, but we sat down with The Devil in Me’s game director, Tom Heaton, to ask exactly what he thinks we should all be looking forward to and why. First, can you tell us what you’re most excited about players experiencing in The Devil in Me compared to what else they’ve seen in The Dark Pictures Anthology? Read more  ( 22 min )
    Lies of P feels even more like Bloodborne in these 12 minutes of gameplay
    The Lies of P gameplay reveal from earlier in the week at gamescom's Opening Night Live was one of the show's highlights. Fans of Bloodborne, in particular, went through it frame-by-frame, dissecting it to see how much resembles FromSoftware's unmatched title. While what we got was fairly brief in the grand scheme of things, there is a longer demo available to some at gamescom. Watching curated clips is one thing, but the longer, unedited walkthroughs are where it's at. The video above, from IGN, offers just that: 12 minutes of uncut gameplay of the show demo. The Bloodborne inspirations are immediately visible; from the era the game takes place in, to the architecture and layout of the place. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Resident Evil Village will be playable on PSVR 2 exclusively at Tokyo Game Show
    Announced via Twitter, Capcom has revealed that Resident Evil Village will have a trial available to attendees on the Playstation VR 2 headset. This particular trial will be available to the public during Tokyo Game Show, and according to Capcom's website, only a limited number of attendees will be able to spend time with Lady Dimitrescu in PSVR 2, as you might've expected. That is if Lady D herself even appears in the particular trial, which is set to feature a part of the Dimitrescu Castle. That said, it probably wouldn't be much of a PSVR 2 trial if we weren't able to experience the nine foot tall vampire tower over us, but only time will tell. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Why 13 years later, Arkham Asylum is still the best Batman game
    The worst day of my life was at EGX about 4 years ago. Nestled in the retro area of the exhibition hall in front of a row of black, plasticy LCD TVs sat a young boy of about 10 years old. Interested in what was passing for retro in this modern era, I hung around for a minute as the loading bar finished spinning and what I saw filled me with hollow, existential dread. Next to the Pac-Man cabinets and CRTs with Super Mario Bros and Sonic the Hedgehog flickering on their screens, the kid wasn’t playing Arkanoid, or Asteroid, or any other -Oid, but Batman: Arkham Asylum on a PS3. Read more  ( 21 min )
    Dark Souls 3 has online features reactivated for PC
    For FromSoftware fans and avid Dark Souls players, it's been a long time spent in the dark without online features. Ever since an announcement to Twitter on 9 February, 2022, explaining that there had been some technical difficulties experienced with the Dark Souls games on PC, the online functionality for the series has been unavailable. The same announcement said that online services would not resume on PC until after the launch of Elden Ring. Elden Ring released just over two weeks later on February 25, and until now, online services for the Dark Souls series on PC has still not been restored. Simply put, it's been a significant amount of waiting for fans of the series. This was in fact due to a Dark Souls exploit that could allow hackers to use remote code execution (RCE) maliciously and even take over another players PC. In a statement to VGC, one player who had discovered the exploit actually shared the details of it to Github and with the developer, but they also stated that little to nothing was done regarding this information until they publicly demonstrated the exploit on Twitch. As a result, the Dark Souls servers then went offline while the developer found a fix for the issues. Read more  ( 16 min )
    You can play Steelrising’s first two levels right now – but there’s a catch
    As promised, Steelrising developer Spiders has launched the game's closed beta. The beta is a pre-order bonus for buying either of the game's editions early, and sadly isn't available in any other way. The Steelrising beta went live just a few minutes ago, and will continue to be available all the way until September 7, one day before the full game's worldwide release. As you'd expect, the content of this beta is limited. You'll have access to the game's first two levels, available to play as many times as you want. You'll also find a couple of weapons to help you in your journey, and you'll even be able to tinker with builds. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The PS5 is getting more expensive
    Sony is doing what many thought is unthinkable. The company announced this morning that it's raising the price of PlayStation 5 consoles across a wide range of markets globally. Company president and CEO, Jim Ryan, broke the news this morning on the PlayStation Blog. In the post, Ryan cited high inflation rates and adverse currency trends as the main reasons behind this price hike, calling it "a necessity given the current global economic environment and its impact on SIE’s business." The United States is the only market that will see no price increase, but Canada, Europe, the Middle East and Africa, Asia-Pacific, and Latin America will get new prices effective immediately. Japan is also getting a price hike, though that will take effect on September 15. Sony did not say whether PS5 accessories, such as the DualSense Controller, will receive a similar hike. Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    Intel Arc Graphics Running On Fully Open-Source Linux Driver
    Intel's GPUs from the consumer desktop Arc Graphics hardware to the Intel Data Center Flex GPU Series "Arctic Sound M" and forthcoming Xe HPC Ponte Vecchio are built around fully open-source drivers. A common misconception or confusion I've heard many times over the past number of months has been questioning whether Intel's discrete GPU driver support on Linux is open-source or is closed-source, etc. Well, it's fully open-source aside from the usual firmware caveat and running on Linux. Here is some initial commentary with running the Intel Arc Graphics A380 on Linux!  ( 7 min )
    Lutris 0.5.11 Released With Amazon Games Integration, Gamescope For NVIDIA R515+
    Lutris as the open-source game manager that integrates with the likes of Steam, GOG, Humble Bundle, and other game collections and emulators is out with a new update...  ( 5 min )
    Readfile System Call Revised For Efficiently Reading Small Files
    Brought up back in 2020 was the readfile system call for efficiently reading small files with the intention of it being simple for reading small files such as those via sysfs, procfs, and similar file-systems. The readfile patches were re-based yesterday against the current Linux 6.0 state, leaving hope that the new system call might finally be sent in for the next kernel cycle...  ( 5 min )
    FreeBSD 14.0 Planned For Release Next July
    The FreeBSD release engineering team has published their initial release plans for FreeBSD 14.0 as well as follow-on FreeBSD 13.2 and 12.4 releases for the current stable series of this BSD operating system...  ( 4 min )
    Linux 6.1 Will Make It A Bit Easier To Help Spot Faulty CPUs
    While mostly of benefit to server administrators with large fleets of hardware, Linux 6.1 aims to make it easier to help spot problematic CPUs/cores by reporting the likely socket and core when a segmentation fault occurs, which can help in spotting any trends if routinely finding the same CPU/core is causing problems...  ( 5 min )
    Atomic Async Page Flips Proposed, Valve's Gamescope Compositor Has Support Pending
    Async page flipping via DRM_MODE_PAGE_FLIP_ASYNC has been available with the Direct Rendering Manager's legacy API but hasn't been supported by the atomic mode-setting interface. However, a proposed patch series would add that atomic async flip support and wire it up initially for the AMDGPU DRM driver. Meanwhile Valve's Gamescope compositor in user-space would be ready to make use of it...  ( 5 min )
    AMD Working On Xilinx CDX Bus Support For The Linux Kernel
    In addition to AMD-Xilinx working on new network driver code, a new DRM display driver, and other kernel features recently covered on Phoronix, they are also preparing upstream Linux kernel support for the "CDX" bus with their FPGA devices...  ( 5 min )
    Explicit Memory Tiers May Be Ready For Linux 6.1
    In addition to MGLRU being planned for Linux 6.1 as a big improvement to the page reclamation code and nice performance benefits, another memory management related change that has been floating on Andrew Morton's "mm-unstable" branch recently has been supporting explicit memory tiers and work around improving the Linux kernel's tired memory support...  ( 5 min )
    GCC Prepares To Drop Support For CompactRISC CR16
    After being marked as obsolete in GCC 12, GNU Compiler Collection developers are now preparing to remove compiler support for the CompactRISC CR16 architecture in GCC 13...  ( 4 min )
    Compiz 0.9.14.2 Released After Two Years
    While the Compiz compositing window manager isn't as popular as it was during its early days of adding animated "bling" to the Linux desktop or when it was in use by Ubuntu, there still are some users having fun with it and a handful of contributors making some maintenance and other progress to it...  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    SD GUNDAM BATTLE ALLIANCE works out of the box on Steam Deck and Linux
    SD GUNDAM BATTLE ALLIANCE is a brand new release from ARTDINK and Bandai Namco Entertainment. The good news is that it works out of the box at release on Steam Deck and Linux desktop.  ( 4 min )
    CrossOver 22 released for running Windows apps and games on Linux
    CodeWeavers, the company that works on Proton with Valve and supports Wine development, has announced the released of CrossOver 22.0.0.  ( 4 min )
    One Lonely Outpost gets a new trailer and a delay until 2023
    One Lonely Outpost is an upcoming sci-fi colonization life and farming sim that was crowdfunded on Kickstarter. It was due this year but it's now delayed but it seems progress is good.  ( 4 min )
    Valve testing new mobile Steam app with QR codes for sign ins
    Valve are now testing a new version of the Steam app for Android and iOS, which comes with a much more modern design and a QR code login system too.  ( 5 min )
    Spider-Man Remastered update out, has a couple Steam Deck fixes
    Spider-Man Remastered is an absolutely awesome game and it's great on both Steam Deck and Linux desktop! A new patch is out with plenty of fixes.  ( 5 min )
    Reminder: Update your PC info for the next round of statistics updates
    This is the public once a month reminder to make sure your PC information is correct on your user profiles. A fresh batch of statistics is generated on the 1st of each month. Also a good reminder of our stats system for people who don't know about it.  ( 3 min )
    Check out my appearance with Brodie on Tech Over Tea
    I had the pleasure of speaking to Brodie Robertson recently on the subject of Linux Gaming, Steam Deck and all sorts of things for you to sit back and chill with.  ( 3 min )
  • Open

    Antoine Beaupré: One dead Purism laptop
    The "série noire" continues. I ordered my first Purism Librem 13v4 laptop in April 2019 and it arrived, unsurprisingly, more than three weeks later. But more surprisingly, it did not work at all: a problem eerily similar to this post talking about a bricked Purism laptop. Thankfully, Purism was graceful enough to cross-ship a replacement, and once I paid the extra (gulp) 190$ Fedex fee, I had my new elite laptop read. Less than a year later, the right USB-A port breaks: it would deliver power, but no data signal (nothing in dmesg or lsusb). Two months later, the laptop short-circuits and completely dies. And here goes another RMA, this time without a shipping label or cross shipping, so I had to pay shipping fees. Now the third laptop in as many years is as good as dead. The left hinge bas…  ( 2 min )
    Jonathan Dowland: IKEA HEMNES Shoe cabinet repair
    Over time the screw hole into the wooden front section of our IKEA HEMNES Shoe cabinet had worn out and it was not possible to secure a screw at that position any more. I designed a little 'wedge' of plastic to sit over the fitting with and provide some offset screw holes.
  • Open

    Playstation VR2 kommer att vara spelbart på Tokyo Game Show
    Och spelet blir Resident Evil Village.  ( 6 min )
    Kopieringsskyddet Denuvo kommer till Nintendo Switch
    För att motverka emulering på pc.  ( 6 min )
    Battlefield 2042:s andra säsong, Master of Arms, släpps nästa vecka
    Karta, vapen, fordon och specialist ingår.  ( 6 min )
    Spana in 12 minuters gameplay från Lies of P
    Den Bloodborne-liknande versionen av Pinocchio.  ( 6 min )
    Dark Souls 3 är tillbaka online efter 7 månader
    Övriga Dark Souls-titlar ska snart också vara säkerhetsfixade.  ( 6 min )
    Skräm dig själv med 3 minuter The Callisto Protocol-gameplay
    Rått och obehagligt från Dead Space-skaparen.  ( 6 min )
    Skräm dig själv med 3 minter The Callisto Protocol-gameplay
    Rått och obehagligt från Dead Space-skaparen.  ( 6 min )
    The Dark Pictures: The Devil in Me skrämmer oss i novembermörkret
    Releasedatumet spikat.  ( 6 min )
    Sony höjer priset på Playstation 5
    Inflation och oro i ekonomin gör PS5:an dyrare.  ( 6 min )
    Forspoken bjuder på en 10 minuter lång gameplay-genomgång
    Magisk parkour!  ( 6 min )
    Här är alla trailers från Future Games Show
    Allt från hungriga tvättbjörnar till mechassisterat jordbruk.  ( 14 min )
    Xbox-chefen Phil Spencer tror på färre exklusiviteter i framtiden
    Man kan alltid hoppas.  ( 6 min )
    Obsidians medeltidsspel Pentiment släpps i november
    Hjälp Andreas att lösa mordmysteriet.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Asus OLED-skärmar lanseras och får svenskt pris – 17 990 kronor för 42-tummaren
    De OLED-baserade gamingskärmarna i ROG Swift-serien erbjuds i storlekarna 42 samt 48 tum och landar snart i butik.  ( 5 min )
    Sony höjer priset på Playstation 5
    Sony meddelar att priset på Playstation 5 kommer att höjas med motsvarande 50 euro på grund av det rådande ekonomiska läget i världen.  ( 6 min )
    Testpilot: Be Quiet Pure Base 500 FX – ett chassi fast i en äldre era
    Testpiloten André "Yatagarasu" Uppman tar sig en närmare titt på uppdaterade Pure Base 500-serien, som nu kommer med RGB-fläktar och USB Type-C.  ( 13 min )
    Corsair avtäcker Xeneon Flex – böjbar gamingskärm på 45 tum med OLED-panel
    I samarbete med LG Display avtäcker Corsair sin senaste gamingskärm, vilken baseras kring en ultrabred OLED-panel som kan böjas vid behov.  ( 6 min )
    Apple visar upp nästa Iphone den 7 september
    I sedvanlig ordning kommer Apple visa upp nya telefoner och tillbehör i höst och showen kommer gå av stapeln 7 september.  ( 6 min )
    Quiz: Fula grafikkortskartonger
    Det fanns en tid då grafikkortskartonger var bland det mest hiskeliga som fanns på butikshyllorna. Hur bra koll har du på olika företags designer genom åren?  ( 5 min )
    Samsung lanserar 990 Pro – stannar kvar på PCI Express 4.0
    Bolagets nya SSD-enhet slopar PCI Express 5.0, men utlovar kraftigt förbättrad prestanda och energieffektivitet mot föregångaren.  ( 6 min )
    Steelseries presenterar nya headset och högtalare
    Tillbehörsmakarna Steelseries slår på stora trumman och uppdaterar både Arctis Nova-serien med nya headset och presenterar högtalare i nya Arena-serien.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

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    Here is that link! -> https://patreon.com/shencomix  ( 2 min )
  • Open

    Compare Files in Linux With These Tools
    Wondering how to compare files in Linux? You can use these command line and GUI utilities to compare files and folders.  ( 27 min )
    15 Ways to Tweak Nemo File Manager in Linux to Get More Out of it
    Nemo is a good file manager with plenty of features. You can further enhance your experience by using these extensions, tweaks and tips.  ( 31 min )
    Linux Mint Release Cycle: What You Need to Know
    Here's what you need to know about the release and update cycle of Linux Mint.  ( 25 min )

  • Open

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    just a normal shen comic, nothing to see here.  ( 2 min )
    Untitled
    No content preview  ( 2 min )
  • Open

    Investigate 18th century murders in The Case Of The Golden Idol demo
    The Case Of The Golden Idol is a detective game in which you explore 2D scenes of grisly murders. As you click around, you'll discover new words to add to your inventory, which you can then use to fill in your explanation of the crime. How did who get into whose room, which person was killed, and how did the murder take place? These are the sorts of questions you'll be answering across 12 different murders - and there's a demo available now, if you want to start to work the case right away. Read more  ( 16 min )
    District 9 director's battle royale gets its first of many cinematics
    Off The Grid was announced earlier this year, the first product of District 9 director Neill Blomkamp's partnership with Gunzilla Games. A new video released tonight offers a longer look at its setting, in the form of a Blomkamp directed in-engine cinematic, while also giving a sense of how the cyberpunk battle royale might feel to play. Watch it below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Floodland is a colourful settlement builder about surviving post-climate collapse
    Here is all I am asking for from any post-society future: let the paint and fabric dyes survive. Floodland, the newly announced survival settlement builder about building back better after climate collapse, is much more interesting to me because the roofs are bright blue, the walls are daubed in orange, the tents are luscious shades of mauve and heliotrope. Watch it below to see what I mean. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Pick up a one-of-a-kind mechanical keyboard for £61 on Amazon UK
    I'm a sucker for a pretty mechanical keyboard, but usually the keebs I'm most enamoured with have price tags to match - think £100 to £200 minimum, and think the upper end of that scale if you want a keyboard that looks like a giant ice cube or weighs a solid 2.3kg. Happily though, there are also now a range of much more affordable keyboards that still include the unusual colour schemes, high-quality components and brilliant typing experiences that make mechanical keyboards so fascinating to me. One of the best makers in this space is Akko, and today a range of their best full-size and compact keyboards are on sale at Amazon UK. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Frontier and Command & Conquer Remastered devs join forces for new WW1 RTS
    It's normally World War II that's the 20th century conflict of choice for strategy games these days (see the upcoming Company Of Heroes 3 and Men Of War 2), but the freshly-announced RTS The Great War: Western Front will be eschewing tradition by putting us in the shoes of Allied or Central Power forces from World War I. Coming in 2023 from publishers Frontier Foundry and the developers behind the Command & Conquer Remastered Collection, let's have a watch of its reveal trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Deliver Us Mars rocks up with a new story trailer
    I just answered the door to a delivery person but they didn’t have the planet I was expecting. That’d be publisher Frontier Foundry, who shared another look at the recently delayed sci-fi space adventure Deliver Us Mars this evening as part of Gamescom's Future Games Show. I thought there’d be more imposing planetary locales to navigate in this sequel to Deliver Us The Moon, and there are, but I wasn’t prepared for a whole bunch of astronauts running about being dramatic. Clue yourself in on what’s happening on Mars by watching the trailer below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Samsung's Odyssey G7 1440p 240Hz monitor is down to £429
    240Hz monitors offer a noticeable increase in motion clarity for fast-paced gaming, and today is a great day to pick one up at a discounted price. We've got two models to show you this time, one 1440p 240Hz model at the higher end and one 1080p 240Hz model that costs less. Read more  ( 16 min )
    What's better: going undercover or a really big unreal place?
    Last time, you decided that a level 1 rat is better than Alone In The Dark's jacket inventory. The jacket only just won, and frankly I blame myself for gussying up the rat with fiction. That jacket is unique! Ah well. The hunt continues. This week, I'm asking you to pick between being out of place or being in an amazing place. What's better: going undercover, or a really big unreal place? Read more  ( 17 min )
    Pippin Barr's hidden game objects exhibition returns in v r ^2
    Over the past decade, indie developer Pippin Barr has regularly shared free game experiments that you can play in your browser, such as Epic Sax, Chesses and its sequel, and the fantastically named Jostle Bastards. Now, Barr has taken another pass at his 2016 game v r 2, which was an exhibition of stuff you could find in the Unity engine’s GameObject menu. Except everything was inside cubes. In v r ^2, or v r squared, everything is out in the open on display. Take a gander at the trailer below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Park Beyond's tools make it easy to craft hilariously dangerous rollercoasters
    Park Beyond, an upcoming theme park management sim in the vein of a juiced up Rollercoaster Tycoon, is trying to balance two slightly opposed teams in its target audience. There are people who love doing the management bits - the bean-counting, optimising the amount of salt on fries to make people thirsty and buy more drinks, paying close attention to demographics and average spends and that sort of kidney*. Then there are people who want to design a park full of cool-ass rides and different themed zones, a true magical wonderland. Inside this Park Beyond are two wolves, in other words, and each needs a different but equally robust set of tools to wrangle. After some hands on with an early build of Park Beyond, I have a little more faith that Limbic Entertainment are going to be able to pull it off. The toolset for building a rollercoast is, in particular, impressive. It's never been so easy to make a ride that breaks both the laws of physics and the laws of health and saftey. The coasters in this game are an absolute menace. In a good way. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Samsung's Odyssey Ark monitor wants to kill your gaming PC
    Samsung have made a lot of great gaming monitors over the years, and they've also been making steady inroads into the realm of cloud gaming through their ongoing partnership with Microsoft. Until now, most of their cloud ambitions have been neatly contained in the console space, but today Samsung have unveiled their latest cloud-enabled PC monitors, presumably in the hope that the combination of Xbox Cloud Gaming, Nvidia's GeForce Now, Stadia, Utomik and Amazon Luna services inside their integrated Samsung Gaming Hubs will be enough to convince folks to part with their towers once and for all. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Tinykin review: a fun Pikmin-like bursting with humorous surprises
    Being shrunk down to the size of a thimble would be my absolute worst nightmare. Think of all the dirt and clumps of dust you’d be grossed out by, and don't even get me started about being outside. Giant horrific insects? No thanks. I’m already emotionally scarred from the giant bug puppets in Honey, I Shrunk The Kids, and it’s the reason I won’t ever play Grounded (soz Obsidian). Thankfully, Tinykin takes a more whimsical approach to this hellish situation. It’s a sci-fi adventure platformer where you and a tiny alien army explore a giant house and, as a bite-size summary, it’s excellent. Splashteam have made a fun, laid-back Pikmin-like bursting with humorous surprises and I played the game with a silly grin on my face the entire time. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Manuscript ‘em up Pentiment has inked a November 15th release date
    If you’d told me back in early June that legendary RPG devs Obsidian Entertainment would be releasing an adventure game set around a medieval German abbey, I would’ve scoffed and called you a charlatan. Speed forwards through time to today, when Obsidian revealed that Pentiment is out on November 15th, and I’m genuinely pleased to hear it. Refresh your memory of Pentiment by watching the game’s trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Space citybuilder Ixion is launching on November 16th
    Sci-fi citybuilder Ixion was one of the best things I played during February's Steam Next Fest demo bonanza earlier in the year, and my only regret is that I didn't write up my thoughts about it at the time because, you know, Elden Ring. Happily, though, developers Bulwark Studios have announced Ixion's release date this morning, so let me tell you about it now. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Destiny 2 to stop removing old expansions, starting with Lightfall in February
    Bungie have announced they're ending an unpopular Destiny 2 practice: removing older expansions to keep the game at a maintainable size. Necessary as it might have been for Bungie, this 'sunsetting' removing content people bought has raised hackles. Now Bungie say they've been working on the game's technoguts, and won't do that anymore. Expansions will stick around forever, though seasonal content will still leave at the end of each expansion cycle—and Bungie don't say anything about bringing back all the old stuff. Read more  ( 18 min )
    A Space For The Unbound devs walk away from “predatory” publisher PQube
    The developers of indie slice-of-life adventure A Space For The Unbound allege that the game’s console publisher in western regions, PQube, withheld information about a diversity grant and used that to leverage for a greater share of the game’s revenue. Mojiken Studio say they were left feeling “manipulated and exploited” by the UK-based publisher’s actions. The Indonesian team have now terminated their contract with PQube and delayed A Space For The Unbound until they can find another publisher. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Blossom Tales II gives the Zelda formula a cute meta-narrative touch
    The only Zelda game I've played was Link's Awakening, on the Game Boy. I do not feel short changed by this. In fact I get the distinct impression it was one of the best, if not the one that most distilled the series' essence. That essence has made its way into Blossom Tales II, a charming light adventure game in the classic "going on an adventure" sense rather than the "rubbing every item on every other item until you're allowed to play again" genre sense. You're playing out a story playfully told by your grandfather, who's cast you as the wee hero of a village out to rescue your brother from the sinister Minotaur King. Both of you occasionally interject, sometimes prompting a decision that changes the game a little as your granddad amends things to your liking. It doesn't go to the full meta-narrative lengths of a Juarez Gunslinger with it, but it's a cute touch and keeps the framing relevant. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Every new trailer from Gamescom Opening Night Live 2022
    Goodness, Gamescom is here already. How did that happen? The yearly German gaming show is back in action, and features the ever-present Geoff Keighley and a smorgasbord of videogame announcements, trailers, updates, and news. There are few better ways to catch a glimpse into some of the biggest upcoming games of 2022 and beyond, and Gamescom's kickoff event Opening Night Live certainly didn't disappoint on that score. In case you missed the show, or you went out for a snack during your favourite game announcement, below we've rounded up absolutely everything revealed at Gamescom's ONL show. Have a read of everything that's coming up, and then sound off in the comments below with your opinions! Read more  ( 30 min )
  • Open

    Intel aims Flex datacenter GPUs at video, game streaming
    Chipzilla's story Arc continues Hot Chips  Intel says its datacenter-focused Flex-series GPUs, codenamed Arctic Sound, are finally ready, and computer makers are expected to begin shipping systems over the next few months.…  ( 5 min )
    80,000 internet-connected cameras still vulnerable after critical patch offered
    Just more IoT conscripts for the botnet armies Tens of thousands of internet-facing IP cameras made by China-based Hikvision remain unpatched and exploitable despite a fix being issued for a critical security bug nearly a year ago.…  ( 5 min )
    Tesla owner gets key fob chip implanted in his hand
    Embedded electronics workaround for his phone's 'aggressive' power management Tesla owner Brandon Dalaly has seemingly implanted a chip in his hand that he uses to unlock his car, among other things.…  ( 6 min )
    Japan reverses course on post-Fukushima nuclear ban
    PM says shuttered plants can re-open, fresh reactors will be built, old ones are getting their lives extended Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said today his country would begin not only restarting nuclear plants sitting idle since the Fukushima affair, but will begin building reactors as well.…  ( 4 min )
    Tesla wants to take machine learning silicon to the Dojo
    Just how bad does existing AI hardware have to be to start from scratch? To quench the thirst for ever larger AI and machine learning models, Tesla has revealed a wealth of details at Hot Chips 34 on their fully custom supercomputing architecture called Dojo.…  ( 7 min )
    VMware confirms Carbon Black causing BSODs, boot loops on Windows
    Well, you can't be attacked if your PC won't boot VMware has admitted an update on some versions of its Carbon Black endpoint solution is responsible for BSODs and boot loops on Windows machines after multiple organizations were affected by the problem.…  ( 4 min )
    Intel shows how chiplets will form Meteor Lake CPUs
    Different core counts, different cache sizes, and various cores possible in mix and match design, it says Hot Chips  Intel has given more detail on how its upcoming Meteor Lake processors will be made from multiple chiplets, enabling it to mix and match to deliver different capabilities, and easing the introduction of its successor, Arrow Lake – which follows the same construction.…  ( 5 min )
    Attacker snags account details from streaming service Plex
    'Limited subset' of users have emails, usernames, and hashed passwords stolen from the streaming site Users of popular streaming and media organizing service Plex are waking up to an unpleasant email this morning saying, in the words of a Reg reader, "Plex have been hacked and their main site is down as we all rush to change passwords."…  ( 4 min )
    ServiceNow: Customers 'struggling to understand the value of ELAs', says Gartner
    Enterprise agreements can increase pricing, marring an overall positive assessment from the analyst ServiceNow customers struggle with its pricing policy, feeling they are being nudged into higher price brackets and failing to benefit from supposed discount packages, according to Gartner.…  ( 4 min )
    NASA's Space Launch System rocket is on track for August 29 liftoff
    Artemis 1 is ready to light its candle NASA's most powerful rocket, the Space Launch System, just passed its flight readiness review, bringing it one step closer to meeting a target launch date of August 29. …  ( 5 min )
    How Google uses mirrors to dynamically reconfigure its networks
    Tiny electromechanical units bounce traffic down different fibers Google has scaled its network capacity from over one petabit per second to beyond six petabits per second since 2015, and some of that growth has come from switches that bounce optical signals off an array of mirrors to redirect traffic.…  ( 5 min )
    How Google uses mirrors dynamically reconfigure its networks dynamically,
    Tiny electromechanical units bounce traffic down different fibers Google has scaled its network capacity from over one petabit per second to beyond six petabits per second since 2015, and some of that growth has come from switches that bounce optical signals off an array of mirrors to redirect traffic.…  ( 5 min )
    UK's largest water company investigates datacenters' use as drought hits
    Utility says there's no reason facilities should be using drinking water, but also wastes a lot itself Thames Water has started looking at the amount of water used by datacenters in the area it serves around London as parts of the UK are hit by drought.…  ( 5 min )
    Python tops programming love list – but if you want a job, learn SQL
    Don't ask us how this is decided, it probably involved a lot of Perl Once again, Python is at the top of the IEEE's annual survey of popular programming languages – seemingly decided by a grab bag of metrics – while SQL appears to be a crucial skill.…  ( 4 min )
    PanWriter: Cross-platform writing tool runs on anything and outputs to anything
    Sometimes you just want something dead simple that can maybe handle bold, italics, and a hyperlink or two FOSS Fest  PanWriter isn't all that small, but it's simple, clean, and does the bare minimum over a plain text editor.…  ( 5 min )
    Amazon has repackaged surveillance capitalism as reality TV
    Smile! You're on Candid Doorbell – and the joke's on us all Column  It's hard to understand why anyone expressed surprise when Amazon's VP of public policy, Brian Huseman, recently admitted sharing data with police.…  ( 5 min )
    Infosys reduces employee bonuses after execs promised better profit margins
    Cost control measures seem to hit CFO too – he's re-used quotes about cuts Concerns over rising labor costs and the subsequent impacts on their profits have led Indian outsourcer Infosys to cut Q1FY23 variable bonuses to an organizational average of 70 percent of theoretical maximum.…  ( 5 min )
    Lloyd's to exclude certain nation-state attacks from cyberinsurance policies
    Kim Jong-un has entered the chat Lloyd's of London insurance policies will stop covering losses from certain nation-state cyberattacks and those that happen during wars, beginning in seven months time.…  ( 6 min )
    Huawei CEO reportedly puts company in survival mode
    Ren Zhengfei warns tough economic times mean it’s time to focus on profit and quality Huawei CEO Ren Zhengfei has reportedly told staff that tough economic times represent a real threat to the company.…  ( 4 min )
    Banned Tornado Cash code reuploaded to GitHub in free speech test
    Cryptography prof tells Microsoft to get forked Earlier this month, the US Treasury Department sanctioned cryptocurrency mixing service Tornado Cash, claiming it provided money laundering for entities deemed national threats to America.…  ( 5 min )
    Meta offers $37.5m to settle location tracking lawsuit
    Users may get around $0.53 each, Facebook would lose about eight hours of annual profit Meta has offered to pay $37.5 million to settle a class-action lawsuit, which claimed its social media platform Facebook illegally harvested location data even when users explicitly denied consent.…  ( 5 min )
    Binance exec says scammers made a 'deep fake hologram' of him to fool victims
    That wasn't actually me on a Zoom call, it was a malicious AI clone built from TV interviews, claims PR A Binance PR exec says crooks created a deep-fake "AI hologram" of him to scam cryptocurrency projects via Zoom video calls.…  ( 5 min )
    Twitter savaged by former security boss Mudge in whistleblower complaint
    Loose access to production systems, out of date software, and more claimed Twitter's former security chief Peiter "Mudge" Zatko accused the company and its board of directors of violating financial rules, of fraud, and of grossly neglecting its security obligations in a complaint to the US Securities & Exchange Commission, the Federal Trade Commission, and the US Justice Department last month.…  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Steam Deck reservations continue to grow, now at its highest point
    Valve has confirmed two tasty bits of info today for those waiting on getting a Steam Deck, and for those curious about how things are currently going.  ( 4 min )
    Get the likes of Parkitect and Project Hospital in this latest game bundle
    Another reasonably good pick here from Humble Bundle with the Career Break Bundle. Here's what's in it and what to expect on Linux desktop and Steam Deck.  ( 4 min )
    Boneraiser Minions is probably my next 100 hour indie obsession
    Stop me if you've heard this before, but I've discovered another game that takes elements from Vampire Survivors and makes it nicely unique again. Enter the world of Boneraiser Minions.  ( 5 min )
    Waves and Waves 2: Notorious are now free after developer passed away
    Waves and Waves 2: Notorious are two rather good twin-stick shooters and sadly, the developer died after a battle with Cancer and so now both games are free to keep for everyone.  ( 4 min )
    Wii U emulator Cemu 2.0 out, goes open source and gets Linux support
    It has finally happened. Cemu, the Wii U emulator has a big new 2.0 release and it is now officially open source and available for Linux too.  ( 4 min )
    Command armies over voice comms, Radio General - Water Rats expansion out now
    Radio General - Water Rats is the first paid expansion for the positively rated unique strategy game, where you call the orders over your microphone.  ( 4 min )
    Games publisher PQube accused of 'predatory practices' and being manipulative
    PQube, a games publisher that has over 50 games on Steam, has been accused by one developer of "predatory practices".  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Supermassive's Dark Pictures Anthology: The Devil in Me gets November release date
    Supermassive Games has announced a release date for its latest Dark Pictures Anthology entry The Devil in Me, which is coming to Xbox, PlayStation, and PC on 18th November. The Devil in Me will be the fourth instalment in Supermassive's Dark Pictures series - following on from Man of Medan, Little Hope, and House of Ashes - and tells the story of a group of film makers trapped in a replica of H. H. Holmes' infamous 'Murder Castle' hotel. Based on everything shown so far, The Devil in Me looks to be something of a departure from previous anthology entries, trading their supernatural overtones for a more grounded, grisly horror inspired by the likes of the Saw and Hostel movies. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Neill Blomkamp's battle royale Off the Grid is an NFT game, unfortunately
    District 9 director Neill Blomkamp is making a video game! I knew that. But what I didn't know is it's one of those blockchain / NFT games. Sigh. This evening's The Future Games Show ended with a fancy CGI trailer showing off the world of Off the Grid, a free-to-play third-person shooter battle royale from new developer Gunzilla Games. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Layers of Fears remake shows off "new story chapter" in latest trailer
    Back in June, Bloober Team - the developer behind The Medium, Observer, and Blair Witch - announced it was remaking Layers of Fear 1 & 2 as a single "psychedelic horror chronicle", and now the studio has shared a first look at a "brand-new story chapter" in its latest trailer. Layers of Fears, as the remake is officially (and ridiculously) known, is being co-developed with Anshar Studios, and will see the original Layers of Fear, its Inheritance DLC, and Layers of Fear 2 rebuilt in Unreal Engine 5, complete with new visuals, gameplay, and expanded plot lines said to "cast a new light on the overarching narrative" as players face "spine-chilling madness that extends over generations." The first Layers of Fear game, if you're unfamiliar, charted the story of a painter on the verge of completing his masterpiece while Layers of Fear 2 told the tale of an actor making a movie onboard a labyrinthine ocean liner, with both games serving up some striking psychedelic imagery as each protagonist began to lose their grip on reality. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The Great War: Western Front is a new WW1 strategy game from the developer of Command & Conquer Remastered
    Petroglyph, the developer behind the excellent Command & Conquer Remastered, has announced a World War 1 strategy game due out next year. The Great War: Western Front, set for launch on PC at some point in 2023, lets you play as both Theatre Commander and Field Commander in a dual-role. Theatre Commander presents turn-based grand-strategy gameplay as you direct the deployment of forces, perform research and manage your resources across the Western Front. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Use déjà vu to bridge realities in hard sci-fi psychological thriller The Gap
    An intriguing-sounding psychological thriller called The Gap was announced during the Future Games Show this evening. It's described as a hard sci-fi first-person narrative game set in 2045, not that the sci-fi elements are particularly apparent from the debut trailer. This shows you, a neuroscientist called Joshua Hayes, waking up on the floor of presumably your own apartment, with a voice - and written messages on the walls - telling you not to trust anyone. But you can't remember what is going on. Hayes suffers from a rare genetic disorder that affects his memory, so the focus in the game is trying to recover those memories by re-experiencing them. The catalyst for this is déjà vu, triggered by objects that act like a bridge to a parallel reality to experience memories again. But there's tragedy hiding in your past, too. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Park Beyond feels like a solid theme park sim with an appealing but inessential gimmick
    If it wasn't for Park Beyond's "impossification" gimmick - with its ludicrous, physics-defying rides - you'd probably be hard pushed to tell it apart from any number of other theme park management games based its trailers so far. As a die-hard management sim fan, though, I couldn't resist the recent opportunity to take developer Tropico developer Limbic Entertainment's latest project for a spin to see what, if anything, it might be able to bring to the familiar theme park genre. Park Beyond's big marquee addition is, of course, the aforementioned "impossification", a twist that wrenches the usually grounded theme park management genre a little out of reality to create a world where technology and physics are no longer limitations. The result is a game where players can build impossible, gravity defying rides, bringing Till Nowak's wonderful short The Centrifuge Brain Project to mind. Based on an early build given to press ahead of Gamescom, though, Park Beyond's impossification gimmick is, perhaps not unsurprisingly, a fun if rather inessential addition to the theme park management genre. Rides, shops, and even employees can be 'impossified' by building a park sufficiently capable of wowing visitors and generating Amazement. Amazement can then be spent at certain thresholds to make increasingly reality defying upgrades - a classic pirate ship swing ride might suddenly gain the ability to split in three, each section whirling in loops independently of the other, while an octopus-themed attraction might come alive, its tentacles hoisting up ride cars and plunging visitors into watery depths for additional thrills. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Everywhere developer responds to "NFT/Crypto" speculation, following vague game reveal
    The developer of Everywhere, the new project from former Grand Theft Auto producer Leslie Benzies, has issued a statement in response to reports highlighting the fact it is currently hiring for multiple positions related to the blockchain. Build A Rocket Boy, which is based in Edinburgh, currently lists three positions based on blockchain development on its website, including a senior backend programmer, smart contract developer and test engineer. Is Everywhere a blockchain game? Does it include NFTs? What, actually, is Everywhere? These questions were all floating around the internet this morning, after a particularly vague reveal for the game last night during Gamescom's Opening Night Live ceremony, where we saw a trailer for the title that gave little away. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Gamescom Opening Night Live special
    This week on the Eurogamer Newscast, we're picking out our favourite bits - and not so favourites - from this week's big Gamescom Opening Night Live showcase. It's a relatively quiet year for Gamescom - though it is lovely to see the show back on its feet and filled with sweaty attendees - and it's fair to say this was reflected in last night's showings. We got a big reveal for Dead Island 2 - which is not set on an island - and a release date for Return to Monkey Island, but otherwise, surprises were thin on the ground, and there were a lot of CGI trailers. Those aside, and ignoring Kojima shilling his podcast, we still got an array of interesting games to look forward to over the next 12 months, even if not all of them were AAA-sized or from franchises you might have heard of. I particularly liked the look of Moonbreaker, Atlus Fallen and Where Winds Meet, games I'd never heard of before last night. But what did everyone else think? Tom Phillips, Ed Nightingale, Victoria Kennedy and Liv Ngan discuss. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Xbox's Phil Spencer wants to see fewer platform exclusives, more cross-play in future
    Xbox boss Phil Spencer has said he'd like to see more game releases that are not tied down to one specific platform, which will in turn allow for more cross-play opportunities. Chatting to Bloomberg, Spencer stated that platform exclusives are something we were all going to see "less and less of" in future, as he hopes for an industry that encourages people to feel safe and included "regardless of what device" they play on. Spencer said he also wanted to see more cross-play possibilties on the market. "Maybe you happen in your household to buy an Xbox and I buy a PlayStation and our kids want to play together and they can't because we bought the wrong piece of plastic to plug into our television," he explained. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Denuvo may start appearing in Switch games
    The company behind controversial anti-piracy software Denuvo has announced an "innovative solution" to the piracy of Nintendo Switch games on PC. Irdeto today published a press release about its Nintendo Switch Emulator Protection solution, as a call to developers and publishers who may be interested in including it with their games. In its statement, Irdeto targets not only first-party and second-party Switch games, but ports of PC games too. "Nintendo consoles have long suffered from piracy issues and the Switch is no different," the company wrote. "Even if a game is protected against piracy on its PC version, the released version on Switch can be emulated from day one and played on PC, therefore bypassing the strong protections offered on the PC version." Read more  ( 15 min )
    Legendary F1 car added to Gran Turismo 7 in August update
    The August update for Gran Turismo 7 is now available, adding a legendary F1 car. The McLaren MP4/4 marked the end of the Turbo era and was driven by Ayrton Senna in 1988 to win the drivers' championship. It's now available to drive in-game. Three other cars have also been included: the Pontiac GTO 'The Judge' '69, the Porsche Cayman GT4 '16, and the De Tomaso Mangusta (Christian Dior). Read more  ( 15 min )
    Bungie to end controversial deletions of older Destiny 2 expansions
    Bungie has announced it will ditch its practice of ritually shedding past Destiny 2 expansions. No content will be lost from expansions from this point forward, Bungie pledged last night during its packed Destiny 2 announcement livestream. However, the game's fabled Content Vault will still continue to gobble up some stuff, including season content beyond its expansion's launch year. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Sierra On-Line founders Ken and Roberta Williams
    I was hoping they'd be on their boat while conducting the interview and they were! Bobbing along. They're super-keen boaters you see - well, not so much boaters as adventurers, which is absolutely appropriate and you'll know why when I eventually get around to telling you who they are. They've sailed across the Atlantic ocean on their own! They've sailed across the Bering Sea up near Alaska, though they took an experienced navigator to help them there. In fact, if it weren't for the Covid-19 pandemic and the lockdown that came with it, they'd probably still be boating and wouldn't have returned to games at all. But being landlocked meant they got bored and so decided, eventually, to make a game again. That, in and of itself, is a remarkable thing, because when these two people left games in the late 90s, they completely left. They didn't so much as look at a game in the two decades that followed. They didn't play a game, didn't keep up to date with the industry - nothing. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Techland highlights changes coming to Dying Light 2 Stay Human
    In its first Community Update, Techland has revealed changes coming to Dying Light 2 Stay Human. So far the improvements are mainly visual. A new Colour Grading option has been added that allows players to change to a "gritty" look similar to the 2019 gameplay presentations. Other visual improvements include new screen space ambient occlusion implementation, image clarity improvements including temporal anti-aliasing and texture filtering, and the ability to toggle Chromatic Aberration. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Splatoon 3 feels like a natural, if uninspired evolution of the series
    I used to play quite a bit of Splatoon back in the Wii U days but in the end I let Splatoon 2 pass me by because, from what I could gather, it basically looked like the same game with just a few minor changes. After going hands-on with Splatoon 3 at a recent preview event, this new sequel felt pretty similar to how I remember the first game playing. Sure, there's a new single-player campaign to play through, along with a bunch of new maps for Turf War and Salmon Run, but to my out-of-touch eye the focus for this sequel seems to be on updating and improving what the players already love, rather than revolutionising the game and giving Splatoon fans something new to wrap their fish fingers around. You can see what I mean in the video below, in which I showcase three early levels from Splatoon 3's new single-player mode, along with two matches of Turf War and a couple rounds of Salmon Run. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Automatoys review - complex brilliance made tactile and delightful
    No moment in games is quite as special as the instance of the fingerpost. This is a rather precise term I once discovered for that exact point in time where something clicks. You suddenly get it. What was confused and difficult becomes immediate and comprehensible. The airplane blasts out of the clouds and sunlight floods the cabin. Whatever it's called, I suspect we spend a lot of our lives chasing this moment. A moment that in games is often accompanied by the crunch and twist of a key in a lock, unseen gears moving, unseen parts turning and clicking into place. Welcome, then, to Automatoys, which gives you this moment every few seconds, it seems, without the moment ever seeming cheap or unearned. The instance of the fingerpost? Here is a field of fingerposts, and each one of them matters. Automatoys lets you lose on a selection of wonderful, complex, improbable machines. They're little sculptures, really, characterful towers made of chunky plastic - I know the exact plastic, and after a few seconds playing so will you - and the objective is always the same. Put the coin in to release the little ball. Then move the ball from the start point to the exit, wherever start point and exit may be. How do you do this? You do this by understanding what the machine does, which means in these cases, understanding what the machine is doing at that moment. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Here are more games confirmed for Xbox Game Pass
    At last night's Gamescom Opening Night Live, a number of games were confirmed as coming to Xbox and PC Game Pass. As already announced, Tinykin, Midnight Fight Express, Immortals Fenyx Rising and Immortality are on their way to the service this month. But more games are coming as shown in the below montage, many of which are day one releases. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Coffee Talk developer delays next game, alleges publisher PQube misused funds
    Toge Productions, the Indonesian indie developer behind Coffee Talk, has today issued a damning statement announcing a delay to its next project due to issues with publisher PQube. The lengthy public announcement, made this morning via Twitter, accuses PQube of misusing money gained from a diversity fund. Toge Productions claims it should have received this money - part of a scheme from a "well known console platform" - to help finance its upcoming project A Space For The Unbound. "The diversity fund was a grant fund intended to help underrepresented game developers, especially during the pandemic," Toge Productions wrote. "However, instead of giving those funds to the developers as the grant was intended, PQube Games intentionally withheld information about the grant and used it as a leverage for their own commercial gain. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Dead Island 2's zombie hordes can be distracted by your voice thanks to Amazon
    A swanky new gaming feature announced by Amazon at Gamescom will let you interact with Dead Island 2 using your voice. This feature is known as Alexa Game Control, and it pretty much does what it says on the tin. With Alexa Game Control in use, players will be able to control aspects of their game via Amazon's voice activated software. Amazon states that the feature will work with "any microphone or headset connected to their PC or console," and therefore "players do not need an Echo device to play games with their voice". You will, however, need an Amazon account (but not necessarily a Prime one). Along with this announcement, Amazon also revealed how this new feature will be implemented in Dambuster Studios' upcoming zombie slasher, Dead Island 2. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Gamescom 2023 has already been announced
    Gamescom 2022 Opening Night Live only happened last night, but Geoff Keighley has already announced when Gamescom 2023 is set to take place. This morning, Keighley took to Twitter to post the announcement. "Give me a minute but Gamescom 2023 dates have been announced - including Opening Night Live," he tweeted, alongside a picture of a banner from the show floor with the dates for next year printed on. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Kirby's Dream Buffet review - prepare to eat a lot of strawberries
    Every game needs a moment - a moment that it alone can offer. I'm thinking of the fuse block in Lumines, where you chain a single colour through a mass of blocks and then set it off and you realise that the entire game is really about laying channels of dynamite. Or the lovely corrugated rumble in WarioWare Twisted where you turn your whole GBA to send a capsule toy down a chute and into your hand. (Random examples; I played both over the weekend.) Kirby's Dream Buffet has that moment. It has the moment that purely belongs to Kirby's Dream Buffet. It comes at the end of one of the races. You have battled rivals and rushed across twisting, treacherous tracks made from waffles, strips of bacon, Victoria sponge, pools of chocolate icing. You're ahead of the pack so when you get to the finish line you can jump into the really, really big bowl of strawberries. And then? Then you spin the left stick - I think it's the left stick; I am always swept up in the sugar rush by this point - to eat all the strawberries. Chomp chomp chomp. It's fabulous stuff. One last strawberry ere we die! And at first this moment is just one bit of business in a game made of bits of business. At first, in fact, you don't so much play Kirby's Dream Buffet as exist through an onslaught of colour and antic chirpiness. Slowly, though, slowly and steadily, structure emerges. But even within the structure there is a certain headlong wildness that remains. As with a house cat, you can never entirely tame Kirby's Dream Buffet. Read more  ( 18 min )
    World Cup runners-up Croatia finally in FIFA 23 after 10-year absence
    World Cup runners-up Croatia are in FIFA 23 after a decade-long absence from the series. The Croatian football association confirmed the national team will appear in FIFA 23 in a tweet. EA also confirmed the news in a tweet. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Under the Waves is an underwater story about grief and ocean preservation
    Submerged story-led game Under the Waves stood out last night during Gamescom's Opening Night Live, where a first trailer for the project was shown. Set beneath the North Sea in an alternate 1970s world, the project will channel the personal losses of its dozen developers at indie outfit Parallel Studio. Under the Waves' development is being assisted by Quantic Dream, the studio famous for various lawsuits, and also Heavy Rain, Beyond: Two Souls and Detroit: Becom Human. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Masahiro Sakurai launches new YouTube channel on game development
    Smash Bros creator Masahiro Sakurai has started a new YouTube channel on game development. Yesterday he posted his final screenshot from Super Smash Bros Ultimate, hinting that something new was on the way. Launching today is Masahiro Sakurai on Creating Games, with a new video available now. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Pentiment secures November release date
    Obsidian Entertainment has announced that Pentiment, its narrative adventure RPG that takes place in 16th century Bavaria, will be coming to PC and Xbox on 15th November. As is to be expected, Pentiment will be available on PC Game Pass and Xbox Game Pass upon its release. For those not subscibed to these services, it is currently listed for £14.99 on Steam. Throughout Pentiment, players will take on the mantle of Andreas Maler, "a very clever journeyman artist who gets caught up in a series of murders and scandals that spans 25 years in the fictional town of Tassing and Kiersau Abbey". Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    Today’s best deals: HyperX Cloud Alpha Wireless, Google Chromecast, and more
    Dealmaster also has the Pixel 6a, Xbox gift cards, and Samsung microSD cards.  ( 9 min )
    New aluminum-sulfur battery tech offers full charging in under a minute
    The big catch is that it has to be at roughly the boiling point of water to work.  ( 7 min )
    Plex imposes password reset after hackers steal data for >15 million users
    Intruders access personal information for the majority of its 30 million users.  ( 5 min )
    “Far out”: Apple confirms iPhone-focused launch event on September 7
    New iPhones and Apple Watches reportedly on tap, while iPads and Macs will wait.  ( 5 min )
    Comedian George Lopez sues Pandora for $5.5M for “brazen” copyright infringement
    A federal court will begin reviewing the case by the end of this month.  ( 6 min )
    Google Pixel sees huge sales growth, has 2% of North American market
    Google's hardware division is still shockingly small, but it's making progress.  ( 5 min )
    Pentiment preview: Obsidian’s historical, religiously charged murder mystery
    Lead dev on Obsidian's first game since Microsoft acquisition: "We can do this now."  ( 6 min )
    Samsung announces 990 PRO SSDs for PCIe 4.0 with big speed bump
    Samsung claims 55 percent gain in random read/write performance over the 980 PRO.  ( 5 min )
    Data privacy bill would give you more control over info collected about you
    It would also force businesses to change how the handle data.  ( 6 min )
    Fitbit announces new Sense 2, Versa 4, and Inspire 3 fitness trackers
    The Sense 2 introduces passive AFib detection while you sleep.  ( 7 min )
    SARS-CoV-2 has evolved an incubation time more like seasonal coronaviruses
    Meta-analysis finds the gap between infection and symptoms has gradually shortened.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Nvidia's GeForce RTX 4090 Could Already Be in Production
    Leaked documents say we could expect Nvidia's GeForce RTX 4090 graphics card this month.  ( 62 min )
    Intel 13th Gen Raptor Lake CPU Pricing Pops Up on Canadian Retailer
    If genuine and not placeholders, the Core i9-13900K, i7-13700K, and i5-13600K Canadian prices would translate to US prices of $725, $510, and $355, respectively.  ( 59 min )
    New DeskPi Cluster Board Holds Six Raspberry Pi CM4s
    New DeskPi carrier board holds six Raspberry Pi CM4s in a Mini-ITX case.  ( 59 min )
    Intel Launches Data Center GPU Flex Series for AI, Gaming, and Video
    Intel's Data Center GPU Flex target AI, cloud gaming, video, and VDI applications.  ( 59 min )
    Pakistan to Tax Graphics Cards Based on Onboard Memory
    Pakistan will now tax graphics cards in accordance with their onboard memory capacity.  ( 59 min )
    Samsung Launches 990 Pro Series PCIe 4.0 SSDs With up to 7,450 MB/s
    These new M.2 2280 form factor NVMe SSDs will be available in October, starting from $179 for the 1TB model, sans-heatsink. Those wishing for a 4TB model will have to wait until 2023.  ( 60 min )
    HyperX's New Gaming Monitors Come With Desk Mounts
    The HyperX Armada 25 and Armada 27 start at $449.  ( 59 min )
    T-Mobile Home Internet Was Great, Until My Service Died And the Company Couldn’t Fix It
    T-Mobile fulfilled its promise of fast speeds and attractive pricing, but the service died after two weeks.  ( 64 min )
    Maker Creates DIY Raspberry Pi Pico GPIO Ethernet Connection
    Twi_Kingyo has created an Ethernet adapter using a Raspberry Pi Pico capable of receiving 10BASE-T input via Ethernet.  ( 62 min )
    Mingda Magician Max Review: If Goldilocks was a Magician
    Mingda’s Magician Max is a large format printer designed with beginners in mind.  ( 63 min )
    Best SSDs 2022: From Budget SATA to Blazing-Fast NVMe
    We recommend the best SSDs for every need and budget based on our extensive lab tests.  ( 86 min )
    How to Create Custom Grub Menu Backgrounds for Linux Boots
    Using Grub Customizer, add a custom background to your Grub boot menu.  ( 60 min )
  • Open

    Morty Smith now available in MultiVersus, check him out in this gameplay trailer
    Morty Smith, the grandson of the mega-genius with the hardest working liver in the galaxy, is now available in MultiVersus. In the game, teenager Morty arrives as a Bruiser class character with a few tricks up his sleeve. His moveset features a mix of skills and attacks. He can use his muscle-enhanced left arm Armothy, and the Plumbus - an all-purpose alien device. He can also whip himself at opponents and use various projectiles. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Where Winds Meet is a lovely RPG set in the final days of the Ten Kingdoms era of Chinese history
    Where Winds Meet is an upcoming game where you forge your destiny in the final days of the Ten Kingdoms era of Chinese history. The open-world action-adventure RPG was announced during gamescom Opening Night Live, and is in development at emerging game development house Everstone Studio. In the game, you will take part in fast-paced martial arts battles, experience different occupations with their own quests, and explore a large game world both beautiful and full of secrets. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Under the Waves is a narrative-adventure about the "engulfing power of grief"
    Parallel Studio and publisher Quantic Dream announced at gamescom a new single-player narrative-driven game titled Under the Waves. In the game, you will dive to the depths of the North Sea in an underwater adventure about the engulfing power of grief. Set in the techno-futuristic 1970s, you will follow Stan, a professional diver working for an oil company, facing the isolation of the deep sea as he starts to experience a strange series of events beneath the waves. Exploration of caves, wrecks, and underwater wildlife will be key to guiding Stan through an unforeseen series of events deeper into the abyss. As you follow the mysterious manifestations of Stan's memories, you will have the difficult choice to remain lost in the depths or return to the surface. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Gotham Knights reveal new villains trailer, and brings release date forward by four days
    Gotham Knights made an appearance at Gamescom Opening Night Live and delivered to us what is perhaps some of the most unusual news of the night. Initially anticipated to release on October 25, developer WB Games Montréal has made a slight change to the game's release date. Nope, it's not being delayed; in fact, it's release is being brought forward by four days. Gotham Knights will now release on October 21, which is certainly good news for all those looking forward to the multiplayer DC game. That wasn't all that there is to Gotham Knights news, though. We were also shown a villains trailer, which revealed that the likes of Clayface and Harley Quinn will be joining the roster, alongside the previously unveiled Court of Owls, Mr. Freeze, and more. Read more  ( 16 min )
    New civilizations coming to Age of Empires 4, play the game for free on Steam now through August 29
    New civilizations are coming to Age of Empires 4 in an Anniversary Update this October. The completely free update will be released on October 25 and will include the Ottoman and Malian civilizations. You will be able to lead the mighty Malians of West Africa, one of the richest trading nations of all time, as you focus on strong economic prowess in mining and investing in gold. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Evil West will let you remove spiders if you’re arachnophobic
    Evil West is one of the best games I’ve seen at Gamescom so far. The game – which only very recently caught a delay into November 2022 – is being developed by Flying Wild Hog (who you may know from Shadow Warrior and Hard Reset) and has seriously impressed me with it’s German showing this week. But those impressions are for another day. In the meantime, there’s good news for players that are terrified of spiders – all 420 million of us. Our eight-legged ‘friends’ can be turned off completely in the game, if you so wish. And that’s a good thing, because there’s a lot of them in there – the little bastards have a connection to the unstable and arcane magic at the center of the game’s story, so you’ll find them nesting in many of the places you’ll need to explore. Flying Wild Hog is the latest developer to factor arachnophobia into its production: back in 2020, Kill It With Fire allowed players to mitigate the spider-yness of the insects by turning them into things that looked more like soft toys. 2021’s Webbed (in which the main character is a spider!) introduced an option that instead turned your protagonist into a cute little blob with eyes, instead. Perhaps the most high-profile game in this sphere, Grounded, has had the option to turn spiders from eight-legged nightmares and into floating dual blobs since 2020. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Goat Simulator 3 gameplay reveal shows off the herd wreaking havoc
    "We're sorry to reveal that Goat Simulator 3 has gameplay." Those are the words of publisher and developer, Coffee Stain, keeping in line with the running theme of chaos, explosions, and goat-shaped tomfoolery. While we already have a good idea of what to expect from the outlandish simulation title, Gamescom Opening Night Live treated us to our very first look at the gameplay of Goat Simulator 3. It certainly looks to be an experience that builds on its predecessor with more secrets to uncover, further multiplayer options to mess with, and even some goat yoga. Goat Simulator 3 follows directly on from the original Goat Simulator (yes, they skipped 2) and revolves around exploration, puzzle solving, and of course, destruction by all means possible. Goats might seem like friendly beings with weird eyes, but in Goat Simulator 3, they are merely agents of chaos. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Atlas Fallen is not a Souls-like, compares itself more to God of War or Horizon: Forbidden West
    You may have seen Atlas Fallen at Gamescom Opening Night back on August 23. The game, the latest project from the Deck13 (who you may recognise from The Surge series), came out of nowhere with its mythological fantasy epic, which casts you as a member of the enslaved human race that gains the power to rip a wrathful god from its throne with a divine gauntlet. Described by the developer as a “semi-open world full of ancient mysteries and threats,” the game looks promising. In a behind-closed-doors presentation with Deck13’s game design director, Jérémy Hartvick, we also learned that players expecting something akin to 2017’s The Surge or 2019’s The Surge 2 should adjust their expectations: this game does not promise the same sort of experience. Instead, says Hartvick, Atlas Fallen will “be more inspired by God of War or Horizon [Forbidden West].” But if you’re after the sort of challenge FromSoft-inspired games offer, don’t fret – the developer notes that Deck13’s next title will launch with three difficulty modes, with the hardest one designed for players that “are more used to games that the company has created before”. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Lies of P will release day one on Xbox Game Pass
    Neowiz has announced that Lies of P, its soulslike RPG that tells the story of Pinocchio, will come to Xbox Game Pass as a day one launch title. Along with the Game Pass news, a brand new trailer was released showing off plenty of gameplay. Lies of P tells the story of Pinocchio, a puppet mechanoid who becomes more human as more lies are told. Becoming more human comes with all the advantages and disadvantages it entails. After waking up in an abandoned train station in Krat, you notice a note in front of you that reads "Find Mr. Geppetto," who is somewhere in the city. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Subnautica developer announces new turn-based tabletop tactics game, Moonbreaker
    Gamescom Opening Night Live boasted a bunch of announcements, but only a few were as impressive as Moonbreaker. Published by KRAFTON, INC and developed by the creators of Subnautica, Unknown Worlds, the new turn-based, tabletop tactics game is set in a sci-fi universe lovingly crafted by Brandon Sanderson. It certainly looks a little different from the deep-sea survival title that is Subnautica, but the same vibrance and charm that many are familiar with has made it way into Moonbreaker, too. Aimed at fans of tabletop and card games, Moonbreaker is designed to bring the fun of a physical miniatures game into a digital space, without the real-world limitations that players may encounter. As players battle across this original sci-fi world, they'll create Rosters of Captains, Crews, and Assists for their turn-based tactics, they'll also be able to express themselves freely through the customisation of their unit. The tabletop title promises constantly evolving painting tools and a unique tabletop experience that's easily approachable. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Here's a new look at High on Life and its wise-cracking weapons
    Rick and Morty co-creator Justin Roiland and Squanch Games have shared the first extended look at High On Life, the studio's take on first-person shooters. The video shows off a battle against the bounty target 9-TORG, talking guns, a talking knife, lots of swears, and the game's irreverent sci-fi setting. Check out the uncensored video below. If you prefer a verbally cleaner version, click here. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Former Bethesda and Obsidian devs form new studio, announce Wyrdsong as first game
    Something Wicked Games, a new studio founded by former Bethesda Game Studios and Obsidian Entertainment veterans, has announced its first game, Wyrdsong. Revealed during gamescom's Opening Night Live, the RPG features a dark, historical fantasy setting where every decision has a consequence - both in this world and others yet to be discovered. Developed with Unreal Engine 5, the game takes place in a fictionalized version of Portugal during the middle ages. Here, players will be challenged to question both their reality and the choices they make. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Splatoon 3 continues with an iterative approach - and it’s brilliant
    Nintendo has a bit of a reputation for changing things up significantly with sequels. Major new Mario games often feature new gimmicks and mechanics, and we’re always left to wait years between Zelda games, despite the fact that Nintendo could get away with pumping them out Assassin’s Creed style if it so wished. Some franchises sit dormant in part because developers are struggling to come up with a sufficiently new and fresh idea. But Splatoon ain’t F-Zero - and it’s thriving with a different, arguably more traditional approach. Nintendo habits are somewhat bucked in Splatoon 3, which continues on from both of its predecessors in a more gently iterative way than is the norm for Nintendo. This is a slightly different approach to most Nintendo sequels - this will be the third Splatoon in seven years, quite a quick pace for a Nintendo franchise - but it fits what Splatoon is. Specifically, it fits the game’s emergence as a competitive powerhouse and online multiplayer success quite well. To some degree it might feel slightly outdated - other online shooters are going free-to-play with battle passes and DLC - while Splatoon is serving up yet another sequel. At the same time, however, there’s a pleasure to this sort of release: you know what you’re getting in your box or download, and know that it’ll be well-supported with events and updates for a reliable period of time post-release, just as the first and second games in this series were. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Killer Klowns from Outer Space: The Game is an outlandish 3v7 horror experience arriving in early 2023
    You'll often catch me complaining that we need to stop turning horror cult classic cinema into video game adaptations. That said, we saw Killer Klowns from Outer Space: The Game revealed at Gamescom Opening Night Live last night. Little did I know that this unexpected reveal from some grotesque looking clowns was exactly what I'd been hoping for, despite it being a 3v7 experience. Killer Klowns from Outer Space is an iconic horror film from 1988. It's silly, outlandish, and all about some unwelcome extraterrestrial visitors that happen to look like clowns. If you've not seen it, you might think it looks stupid, and in some areas, it is, but that's exactly what is so great about the film; it doesn't take itself too seriously, while also being a fun, horror experience that takes you back to the eighties. With that in mind, as well as the bazooka-like popcorn gun and cocoons that people end up trapped in throughout the film, it makes perfect sense that Killer Klowns from Outer Space is being adapted into a video game set to release in early 2023. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Deck 13 explores new combat territory in upcoming action-rpg Atlas Fallen
    Atlas Fallen was one of many brand new cinematic trailers shown off during Gamescom Opening Night Live last night — introducing a sand-filled ruinous world filled with scraps of humanity, monsters, and sand-wielding weapon masters pulling off high-flying attacks. It was quite the eye catcher, and as its coming from the once technological factories of Deck 13 (creators of the surprisingly great The Surge series), it’s one we’re excited for. The new trailer can be watched for yourself below, but in addition we’ve got some further info courtesy of two blogs from both the official Xbox and PlayStation websites. Ahead of the game’s 2023 release on Xbox Series X/S and PlayStation 5, there’s a decent amount to dig into. Starting with the official PlayStation blog post, game designer Jeremy Hartvick explains that the action RPG is all about “spectacular fights”, and that the team is aiming for “fast-paced and effects-loaded fights that require skill and timing.” Read more  ( 16 min )
    Hyenas actually looks like a pretty fun shooter – if you can get over Sega’s autoerotic love-in
    Total War, Alien: Isolation, Hyenas – three games that could not be further apart in tone if they tried. Yet, that’s Creative Assembly for you: a British institution known for its quality and prestige, that came out of nowhere (well, not quite nowhere) earlier this year to unveil Hyenas – a multiplayer, multi-team heist shooter that takes great joy in big explosions, pop culture references, and zero-g movement to deliver a game unlike anything the studio has put out before. In a hands-off presentation at Gamescom, I was shown a very bubbly and overtly energetic video that highlighted the main gist of Hyenas: infiltrate a spaceship-cum-shopping-mall, pilfer loot (the relics of a ruined earth), and escape before anyone else can hunt you down and take your shit. The game itself – complete with zero-g sections that make you rethink gun fights, and special abilities that’d make even Apex Legends think ‘oh, that’s a bit much’ – seems tight. Creative Assembly knows what it’s doing, after all. These devs aren’t amateurs. Sure, the footage we clocked was alpha and some of the animations and collisions are a bit unfinished, but the thrust of the game is there: teams of three, each with a set of specialties, but all encouraged to get stuck into each and every fight. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Open-world survival MMO Dune: Awakening announced for PS5, Xbox Series, and PC
    Last night, Gamescom 2022 was the mindkiller for many. However, one highlight had to be the announcement for Dune: Awakening. A cinematic trailer, sure, but still a world I personally would love to explore more through the medium of video games. An open world survival game coming to PC, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S, the game has yet to be given a release window. However, you can wishlist the game now on Steam and sign up to an open beta right now on the official website. According to the official press release, the game will take inspiration from both the classic novels authored by Frank Herbet, as well as the recent (and brilliant) film from Denis Villeneuve. The game claims to combine “the grittiness and creativity of survival games with the social interactivity of large-scale, persistent multiplayer games to create a unique and ambitious Open World survival MMO”. Think games like Rust or DayZ but solidly set on the legendarily un-solid sands of Arrakis. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Outlast Trials announced, here's how to sign up for the closed beta
    Red Barrels has finally given fans a glimpse at what's to come, and that's The Outlast Trials. We've known about the latest Outlast instalment for some time now, but it's been a while since we'd heard any real news about the horror title. Well, that changed at Gamescom Opening Night Live. Red Barrels revealed a brand-new closed beta trailer for the game, which takes us back to a more familiar setting than that of the lacklustre Outlast 2. No, it's not Mount Massive Asylum. Instead, The Outlast Trials takes us to Sunshine Orphanage which seems to promise the same claustrophobia and endless corridors to get lost in. It appears we'll also even be able to explore an amusement park and various underground streets as we once again try to get to the bottom of Murkoff Corporations cruel experiments. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Telltale provides first look at gameplay for upcoming game, The Expanse
    The Expanse has received its first gameplay trailer courtesy of Gamescom Opening Night Live last night, showing off the sci-fi horror mystery title from Telltale Games for the first time. Planned for a summer 2023 release date — with no platforms currently announced — this would make The Expanse the first game from studio Telltale Games since Guardians of the Galaxy: A Telltale Series five years ago. The trailer shows much of that classic narrative focus you’d expect from a Telltale project, with a emphasis on characters and conversations with them, as well as the implication of some serious decision making as you hover your hand over an airlock button. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Sony introduces DualSense Edge, a wireless customizable controller for PlayStation 5
    Sony has announced a new, customizable controller for PlayStation 5. Called DualSense Edge, the controller features changeable stick caps and back buttons, as well as replaceable stick modules. There are three types of swappable stick caps: standard, high dome, and low dome, and each will help maintain grip and stability. The two swappable sets of back buttons can be configured to be any other button input while the replaceable stick modules can be fully replaced. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Everywhere from studio made up of former GTA devs gets a teaser trailer
    Build A Rocket Boy, the studio made up of former GTA developers, has revealed its multi-world gaming experience Everywhere. The game is slated to be released in 2023 with platforms to be announced. Announced back in 2017, the studio was founded by GTA veterans Matthew Smith, Colin Entwhistle, and Leslie Benzies. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Dying Light 2 DLC Bloody Ties moved to October 13, new community update released
    Techland has announced a new release date for the Blood Ties DLC, the first post-release story content drop for Dying Light 2. Originally set to release earlier this before being moved into September, Bloody Ties will now arrive on PC alongside PlayStation and Xbox consoles October 13. The DLC will feature new challenges and quests, arena fights, new weapon fights, and more as you try to reach Carnage Hall. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The Callisto Protocol trailer takes you on a deadly trip through a sewage system
    This week at gamescom, Striking Distance Studios introduced a new mechanic called Mutations that adds depth to The Callisto Protocol's combat. Mutations will play out via the creatures in the game, called Biophage. These creatures are inmates at Black Iron Prison, transformed by a mysterious outbreak. As the contagion spreads, it erupts from the body through a series of tentacles. When the tentacles emerge, you have only a short window to kill the virus by shooting the tentacles. Kill the virus, and you get a quick takedown of an enemy, miss and...well, try not to miss. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Lords of the Fallen reboot coming in 2023
    The Lords of the Fallen, a reboot of the original fantasy action-RPG Lords of the Fallen, was unveiled during gamescom Opening Night Live tonight. Developed by Hexworks (a CI Games studio), the reboot of the 2014 game is in development for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X/S with Unreal Engine 5. Set for release in 2023, The Lords of the Fallen was revealed during the show with a three-minute cinematic trailer showcasing the game’s new, dark fantasy setting, narrated by actor Joseph Quinn (Stranger Things, Game of Thrones). Read more  ( 15 min )
    Return to Monkey Island sets sail on PC and Switch September 19
    Terrible Toybox, Devolver Digital, and Lucasfilm Games have announced Return to Monkey Island will be released in September for PC and Nintendo Switch. Revealed during today’s gamescom Opening Night Live event, wannabe pirates can pre-order the game now to claim the "highly exclusive and entirely useless Horse Armor" for use upon release. The game finds Guybrush Threepwood, the leather jacket salesman, pirate-extraordinaire, and intrepid hero embarking on a new swash-buckling adventure through the Caribbean. Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    AMD Lands Video Encoding Quality Improvements For Mesa 22.3
    AMD has merged video acceleration quality improvements into Mesa 22.3's Gallium3D VA front-end for benefiting open-source video acceleration on Radeon GPUs...  ( 4 min )
    Intel Announces Data Center GPU Flex Series
    Intel's Arctic Sound M is being announced today as the Intel Data Center GPU Flex Series.  ( 6 min )
    Intel Begins Readying Graphics Driver Changes For Linux 6.1 - More DG2/Alchemist Work
    Intel open-source engineers have readied their first batch of "drm-intel-gt-next" changes for DRM-Next of material they are preparing for introduction with the Linux 6.1 kernel cycle later this year...  ( 5 min )
    Cemu Emulator For The Wii U Now Open-Source, Building On Linux
    Cemu is a popular emulator for the Nintendo Wii U that can successfully run many games as well as homebrew titles. Cemu started off with just Windows support but then at the beginning of the year laid out plans to go open-source and provide Linux support. They've pulled that off and the code is now out there in a public GitHub repository...  ( 4 min )
    Intel To Split Off Their Old Haswell/Broadwell Vulkan Code Into Separate Driver
    The current Intel open-source "ANV" Vulkan driver within Mesa supports graphics hardware going back to the "Gen7" graphics found with Ivy Bridge / Haswell. However, Intel open-source Linux graphics driver engineers are preparing to separate the old Ivy Bridge / Haswell (Gen7) and Broadwell (Gen8) graphics into a separate Mesa driver so they can better focus on improving their modern Vulkan driver that would then be limited to Skylake Gen9 graphics and newer...  ( 6 min )
    "xisxwayland" Version Two Released For This Simple X.Org Program
    The X.Org project "xisxwayland" is out with a new version of this simple program that can be easily called by shell scripts and other simple uses for checking to see whether the running X.Org Server is a genuine X11 server or more commonly these days an XWayland server running within a Wayland environment...  ( 4 min )
    Mesa CI Begins Making Use Of Mold Linker For "Substantial" Performance Improvement
    For speeding up the actual Mesa continuous integration (CI) process itself with frequently building new revisions of Mesa3D, their CI infrastructure is beginning to make use of the Mold linker as a high performance alternative to the GNU Gold and LLVM LLD linkers. This is yielding a "substantial" performance improvement in tests for being able to turnaround CI jobs faster and in turn allowing Mesa developers to be more efficient...  ( 5 min )
    3mdeb Eyes Fwupd Support For DragonFlyBSD To Handle UEFI Firmware Updates
    Open-source firmware consulting firm 3mdeb last year worked on Fwupd support for FreeBSD so system firmware updates can be more easily handled on that popular BSD operating system and leveraging the Fwupd/LVFS infrastructure that's been happening for years in the Linux space. Their most recent target is now DragonFlyBSD for handling of UEFI firmware updates with Fwupd...  ( 5 min )
    RADV Prepares To Switch Completely To Dynamic Rendering
    One of the great things about Jason Ekstrand having joined Collabora at the start of the year is that the former Intel graphics engineer, who was on the team that created their original Vulkan driver, can now work on whatever open-source driver code he wishes. Among other upstream Mesa work, he's recently been contributing to the new "NVK" NVIDIA Vulkan driver and also the RADV driver too...  ( 4 min )
    Google Posts Updated Encrypted Hibernation Patches For Linux
    Back in May there was a patch series by Google engineers working on encrypted hibernation support for Linux that would be protected by the platform hardware itself like with a TPM module as well as user authentication by a password or other means. Sent out today is a second revision to that Linux encrypted hibernation support...  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Här är lanseringstrailern för The Last of Us Part I
    Lika brutalt och vackert som vi minns det.  ( 6 min )
    Hearthstone ska få premiumvaluta och spelare befarar pay-2-win
    Men lyckligtvis bara för Battlegrounds-läget.  ( 6 min )
    Den nya Destiny 2-säsongen har anlänt: Season of the Plunder
    Och den klassiska King's Fall-raiden gör comeback.  ( 7 min )
    Snabbkollen - Hur bra var Gamescom-showen?
    Tyck till om öppningsshowen.  ( 6 min )
    Park Beyond
    Omöjligheten är fullt möjlig i Planet Coaster-utmanaren Park Beyond.  ( 8 min )
    Kontrollera Dead Island 2 med din röst
    Kan vi i framtiden säga: “Alexa, hugg av huvudet på den vidriga zombien”?  ( 6 min )
    Hurra! Oculus Quest 2 kräver inte längre Facebook-inloggning
    Nu kan du logga in med ett Meta-konto.  ( 7 min )
    Wyrdsong - nytt RPG från folk bakom Fallout, Skyrim, Dragon Age och Outer Worlds
    Utvecklaren har tung meritlista.  ( 6 min )
    Äntligen mer info om Telltales The Expanse-spel
    Hårdkokta rymdtjejer och Dead Space-liknande skräck.  ( 6 min )
    Quiz – Vad kan du om GTA-lika spel?
    Saints Row är tillbaka, som påminner en del om GTA-upplägget. Och på tal om det...  ( 6 min )
    Kolla in The Finals - free to play-action från Patrick Söderlunds Embark
    Lagbaserad multiplayer-action står på menyn.  ( 6 min )
    Hideo Kojima har utannonserat ... en podcast
    Men säger även att han jobbar på flera spel.  ( 7 min )
    Brandon Sanderson har format världen i Subnautica-utvecklarnas Moonbreaker
    Nu vet vi vilket spelprojekt den kända författaren jobbat på.  ( 6 min )
    Cities: Skylines ska få en expansion som fokuserar på fotgängare
    Lägg till lite lugnare områden i din stad.  ( 6 min )
    Destiny-liknande The First Descendant har fått en första trailer
    Utvecklat i Unreal Engine 5.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    sudo apt update vs upgrade: What’s the Difference?
    apt update or apt upgrade? Do not both of them update your system? What's the difference between the two similar commands?  ( 25 min )
    Blackbox is an Aesthetically Pleasing Terminal for Minimalists Linux Users
    Blackbox is a new project in development that focuses on giving you a good-looking terminal emulator for your beautiful Linux setup.  ( 24 min )
  • Open

    Jonathan Dowland: Our Study, 2022
    Two years ago I blogged a photo of my study. I'd been planning to revisit that for a while but I'd been somewhat embarrassed by the state of it, but I've finally decided to bite the bullet. Fisheye shot of my home office, 2022 What's changed The supposedly-temporary 4x4 KALLAX has become a permanent feature. I managed to wedge it on the right-hand side far wall, next to the bookcase. They fit snugly together. Since I'd put my turntable on top, I've now dedicated the top row of four spaces to 12" records. (There's a close-up pic here). My hi-fi speakers used to be in odd places: they're now on my desktop. Also on my desktop: a camera, repurposed as a webcam, and a 90s old Creative Labs beige microphone; both to support video conferencing. The desktop is otherwise, largely unchanged. My Am…  ( 2 min )
    Emmanuel Kasper: Investigating database replication in different availability zones
    Investigating today what is AWS Relational Database Service with two readable standbys Considering your current read/write server is in Availability Zone AZ1, this is basically postgres 14 with synchronous_standby_names = ANY 1 (az2, az3) and synchronous_commit = on. In regards to safety of data, it looks similar to the raft algorithm used by etcd with three members as a write is only ack’ed if it has been fsynced by two servers, the difference is that raft has a leader election, whereas in PostgreSQL the leader is set at startup and you have to build yourself the election mechanism. There is no special cloud magic here, it is just database good practices paid by the minute.  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Asus avtäcker påkostat Mini ITX-moderkort för Ryzen 7000
    Bolagets modell ROG Strix X670E-I tar den kommande processorfamiljen Ryzen 7000 och styrkretsen X670 till formfaktorn Mini ITX.  ( 6 min )
    Tävla med LG Ultragear och vinn biljetter till League of Legends-finalen i Malmö
    Snart är det dags för final i League of Legends European Championship. LG Ultragear ställer upp med 16 biljetter till SweClockers.  ( 6 min )
    Plex utsatt för dataintrång – lösenordsbyte rekommenderas
    Strömningsplattformen Plex rapporterar att de drabbats av ett dataintrång, i vilket en skara användarnamn och krypterade lösenord har läckt ut.  ( 5 min )
    Veckans fråga: Hur gammalt är ditt nuvarande chassi?
    När det byggs dator kan man antingen börja helt från grunden med sprillans nya komponenter och chassi, men oftast blir det en uppgradering av en befintlig PC. I veckans fråga undrar vi hur gammalt ditt nuvarande chassi är.  ( 6 min )
    Playstation 5 får proffsigare kontroll med Dualsense Edge
    Sony kontrar Microsofts Xbox Elite-kontroller med en egen variant till Playstation 5 som utrustats med extra knappar och funktioner.  ( 6 min )
    The Shrimp ger spelare en avskalad upplevelse
    The Shrimp är ett minimalistiskt tangentbord som ger spelare det som behövs för att spela på vift.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Comic for 2022.08.24 - Murder
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )
  • Open

    Tetherball Configurations
    No content preview  ( 1 min )

  • Open

    Become a rad assassin or peaceful doctor in open world wuxia RPG Where Winds Meet
    Where Winds Meet is a third-person open-world action RPG set in good ol’ medieval China. How do I know that? Because Gamescom Opening Night Live showed the first trailer today. The game is set during China’s Ten Kingdoms period, and the kind of supernatural abilities you’d only find in a wuxia movie. Watch it for yourself below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Honkai: Star Rail's latest trailer shows more of its cosy space train
    Every Honkai: Star Rail trailer I watch focuses entirely on its many characters and their interpersonal drama, and the latest is no different. Dark pasts? Dark dreams? Dark academia bedrooms? It has all three. As per usual, I am just here for the fun of an old-fashioned train that can fly through space. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Gotham Knights is coming out an entire four days earlier, for some reason
    It's not often that we get to report a game coming out earlier than planned rather than delaying the date, so it's nice to be able to tell you that Gotham Knights has moved its release date up. It's only by four days, though, to October 21st, which is sort of baffling. Maybe Warner Bros. are about to announce a new DC-verse TV show coming out on the Knights' original release date of the 25th? Who knows. But along with this early-release sneak attack is a new trailer, giving us a closer look at the rogues gallery that the extended Bat-family are up against. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Pinocchio RPG Lies Of P's new trailer doubles down on its Bloodborne vibes
    Grim Souls-like Lies Of P will be hitting PC sometime in 2023 according to a new gameplay trailer shown at Opening Night Live during this year's Gamescom. The RPG combines the story of Pinocchio with some major Bloodborne energy, as the puppet searches for a way to become a real human boy in a decimated city. This is far from the classic fairytale story though. With a dark-gothic backdrop and mechanical killer robots to contend with, Pinocchio has his work cut out for him. You can watch the new bombastic gameplay trailer below: Read more  ( 16 min )
    Grab a 15.6-in portable OLED monitor for $200 at Amazon US
    Portable monitors are pretty awesome - they're an easy way to get a dual screen setup going on a laptop, and also work well to expand the Steam Deck's rather modest screen into something a little more co-op friendly. Of course, they also work for desktop computers too - and are much more portable and space-saving than an average actual desktop monitor. You can even get OLED models now - and a coupon code on Amazon US brings one model down from Innocn from $350 to $200 when you tick the 'coupon' box on the product page. That's quite a bargain for a 15.6-in portable screen of this calibre. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Outlast Trials' closed beta will run over Halloween weekend
    Outlast is filled with creepy doctors performing horrifying surgeries in the dark, but upcoming co-op sequel The Outlast Trials is now going to let you share that trauma with a friend. A new trailer debuted at Gamescom Opening Night Live this evening, and revealed that the closed beta will run over Halloween weekend, from October 28th to November 1st. You can head over to the Steam store page to request access now. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Yep, Dead Island 2 is shambling onto PC in February 2023
    Dead Island 2 will launch on February 3rd 2023, today’s Gamescom Opening Night Live event has revealed, confirming the details from last week's big Amazon leak. By that point, it’ll have been almost nine years since the zombie-bashing game was first announced at E3 2014. Gaze in astonishment at the existence of a new trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Fallout 76 project lead opens new studio making new open-world RPG
    Jeff Gardiner, a longtime Bethesdaman whose ended his 15-year run as project lead on Fallout 76, today announced he has a new studio making a new open-world RPG. Wyrdsong is its name, and supernatural shenanigans set in quasi-historical Portugal is its game. The new studio, Something Wicked Games really only have concept art to show right now, but I do believe both wizards and swords are involved. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Scars Above is a sci-fi space shooter with big Returnal energy
    When I first played PlayStation exclusive Returnal last year, I didn't think it would be my jam. I've never been one for bullet hell shooters, and especially not super difficult ones that also double up as roguelikes. Turns out, it absolutely was my jam, and I think Scars Above, the new third-person sci-fi action shooter from Mad Head Games that was revealed tonight at Gamescom Opening Night Live, will be, too. Let's have a watch of the reveal trailer, shall we? Read more  ( 17 min )
    Former Battlefield devs are making a shooter with destructible levels set inside a game show
    When co-op shooter Arc Raiders was delayed a couple of weeks ago, Embark Studios said that it was because development on their other project, an unannounced shooter, had progressed faster than expected. Well, tonight they announced that other shooter. It's called The Finals, it's a team-based shooter framed as a game show, and there's an extremely brief teaser trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Pick up the Samsung Odyssey G5 27-in 1440p 165Hz gaming monitor for £209
    The Samsung Odyssey G5 is a solid 1440p 165Hz monitor, and it has the benefit of being significantly cheaper than other options. It's normally around £299, but now it's been reduced to £209 - and that seemed like as reasonable a reason as any to write up a little blog about it. Read more  ( 16 min )
    New fantasy ARPG Atlas Fallen looks like Diablo meets Monster Hunter
    One of the most traditonally epic trailers from the Gamescom-themed Opening Night Live tonight was for Atlas Fallen. It's a new fantasy action RPG, with super powers, set in a semi-open world. In what is becoming something of a theme for me tonight, however, the trailer doesn't really give much away about the game aside from the topline selling points. There is a tiny, teeny smattering of gameplay at the end, though. Big swords, big monsters, big magic, big sand. In another continuing theme from games revealed tonight, Atlas Fallen is out next year. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Phantom Hellcat is a theatrical hack-and-slasher that switches perspectives
    I'd be interested enough in Phantom Hellcat if it was a stylish third-person 3D hack-and-slasher - which it is. But it's also a stylish 2D hack-and-slasher, and the perspective shift - and the odd, theatrical world that it reveals - is the most interesting thing about the 30 second announcement trailer. Watch it below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Expanse: A Telltale Game's new trailer shows you can float around between ethical quandaries
    It’s been some time since we heard anything new about Telltale and Deck Nine’s game based on James S.A. Corey’s The Expanse sci-fi universe. At today’s Gamescom Opening Night Live though, the episodic experts showed off some new gameplay footage from the upcoming The Expanse: A Telltale Game, along with a behind-the-scenes chat. Witness a revivified Telltale in action in the trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Cult horror flick Killer Klowns From Outer Space is getting turned into a game
    Will clowns ever not be creepy? I've not seen 1988 film Killer Klowns From Outer Space, but from the look of the game adaptation's trailer, I don't think I ever want to. Announced during Opening Night Live at this year's Gamescom, the cult classic horror flick is getting a multiplayer horror game release. If you're not familiar with the film, the title kinda says it all. A group of aliens disguised as clowns invade earth and start killing people - simple! I'm told the trailer harkens back to some iconic moments from the film, so take a look below: Read more  ( 16 min )
    Park Beyond's latest trailer reveals modular building and more ridiculous theme-parkery
    S'been a while since we've had a proper in-depth theme park sim, hasn't it? Park Beyond was revealed almost exactly a year ago, when the devs also talked a lot about the concept of "impossification", but it's been all quiet on the rollercoaster front since then. Tonight, at the Opening Night Live marking the start of Gamescom, we saw a shiny new trailer showing off some of the building tools and wacky modules you can build into your coasters. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Genshin Impact 3.0 gets one final trailer before release
    Genshin Impact's 3.0 update will launch - depending on what timezone you're in - either tomorrow or later tonight. If you're counting down the final six hours before its release, you can now spend that time watching the new trailer 187 times. It shows the new characters and the region of Sumeru and you'll find it below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Friends Vs Friends is a stylish deckbuilding FPS to destroy your online mates with
    Well, here's a nice surprise. Brainwash Gang, the makers of narrative language game Grotto, unveiled their next project this evening at Geoff Keighley's Opening Night Live showcase, and it's a funky, vibrant, online deckbuilding FPS called Friends Vs Friends. Think Neon White, but instead of competing with your friends on leaderboards, you're blasting their little cell-shaded noggins in real time in either 1v1 or 2v2 battles. Here's the reveal trailer. Read more  ( 17 min )
    The Surviving Mars devs are making a survival sim about marooned astronauts
    Stranded: Alien Dawn is a new sci-fi survival sim coming from the developers of Surviving Mars, Haemimont Games, announced at today’s Gamescom Opening Night Live event. It’s set on a planet that’s a teensy bit greener than the red one near us, and heads into early access on Steam in October. Tap your instruments before checking out the sort-of-but-not-really live action reveal trailer below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Return To Monkey Island is out on Talk Like A Pirate Day next month
    Everyone has one or two things that still make them all happy and excited, with no trace of cynicism whatsoever, and one of mine is Monkey Island. I've not yet seen anything I didn't like of Return To Monkey Island. It's a new instalment in the classic point 'n' click 'n' pirate series being made under the loving care of Ron Gilbert and Dave Grossman, two of the original devs, and now we know there's only a few more weeks to wait. Return To Monkey Island is coming soon to a computer near you on September 19th. There's a new trailer to prove it. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Homeworld 3 understands space battles are coolest around megastructures
    Nebulae are nice and black holes are dramatic, but I firmly believe that space battles are at their very coolest when whizzing around supersized ships and megastructures. I am therefore delighted by the new Homeworld 3 trailer showing a battle around sprawling technoruins in the long-awaited spaceship strategy sequel. And yes, absolutely it still has those cool Tron engine trails. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Quantic Dream are publishing poetic underwater adventure Under The Waves
    Note to self: can we please stop using the sea as a metaphor for grief, please? A Memoir Blue just about got away with it earlier in the year, but now it looks like we're going for another sorrowful dive with Under The Waves, a new poetic narrative adventure developed by Parallel Studio and published by *deep breath* Quantic Dream. Announced at Geoffcom's Opening Night Live showcase tonight, we'll be "exploring the depth of the sea and human grief" when Under The Waves launches in 2023. Here's a reveal trailer. Read more  ( 17 min )
    A Lords Of The Fallen reboot is in the works
    Dark-fantasy RPG Lords Of The Fallen is getting a surprise reboot being developed by CI Games studio HexWorks. Announced during Opening Night Live at Gamescom, The Lords Of The Fallen is an action Soulslike that looks to be in the same vein as the original - lots of knights, swords, and undead - but, interestingly, the reboot has a completely different story set thousands of years after the events of the original. The cinematic trailer doesn’t showcase any gameplay, but it does spotlight what lies in store for fans. Feast your eyes on the lavish trailer below: HexWorks Studio are calling The Lords Of The Fallen a "spiritual successor" to the original and, from the look of the trailer, have kept to the game's dark-fantasy origins. Players will be navigating the world of the living and the world of the dead with combat that's a mixture of magic and melee. You’ll also be able to play with a bud in online co-op and as the saying goes: those who slay together, stay together. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Sonic Frontiers dashes onto PC in November
    Greetings, fellow kids! Sonic Frontiers is out on November 8th. If that date sounds familiar then that’ll be because it’s the one that’s been leaked for ages. Sega have shown off some hints at the game's story during today's Gamescom Opening Night Live event. Gawp at the release date trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Ex-GTA dev's new studio reveals Everywhere, which is probably like either Roblox or Second Life
    Having watched a trailer for Everywhere, revealed at the Opening Night Live event marking the start of Gamescom 2022, I can tell you that hooooboy, this game sure does exist. Beyond that, I'm not sure I can say anything. Developers Build A Rocket Boy describe it as "an original multi-world experience" that "will blend gameplay, adventure, creativity, and discovery in a space that blurs the line between reality and the digital world". So it will probably be either like Roblox or like Second Life, then? Hopefully we'll get a greater sense of which by the time it's out, which will be in 2023. The teaser trailer is a montage of stuff happening quickly in the shape of the logo. Read more  ( 17 min )
    The Callisto Protocol has those good Dead Space deaths
    One of the best parts of Dead Space is watching your man die horribly in little pieces, so I'm delighted to see that continue in the next game from several former Dead Spacers. A new The Callisto Protocol gameplay video fresh from Gamescom shows our beefy boy tumbling down the deadliest waterslide since Tomb Raider 2013, complete with gruesome mutilation at the end. Great. Thanks. Delighted. Ta! Read more  ( 16 min )
    New Tales From The Borderlands is coming October 21st
    After being teased earlier this year, we got our first proper glimpse at Gearbox's New Tales From The Borderlands game this evening, courtesy of Geoffcom's Opening Night Live showcase. Heck, we even got a release date, and it's real soon - October 21st, folks, so mark your calendars. Let's watch that brand-new gameplay trailer, shall we? Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Subnautica devs are doing a turn-based, space-pirates, tabletop miniatures game called Moonbreaker
    Imagine I have a weird alien squid pointed right at you. I need you to tell me what the developers of open-world watery survival game Subnautica are making next. Just, your best guess, or the squid'll getcha with its weird alien ink. Ready? Go!.... Okay, well congratulations to anyone who said "a turn-based strategy game inspired by tabletop miniatures". Unlikely as it may seem you were right, and everyone else was wrong. It's called Moonbreaker and it's hitting early access on September 29. And Brandon Sanderson is at this party, too. I admit it was a trick question, but look, I'm a genuinely big fan of devs doing a completely different project after a successful game. I also know a whole lotta people who love painting plastic fighters in cool colours, carefuly placing them on a tabletop, and slowly pushing them into other plastic fighters in different colours. I'm absolutely sure that Unknown Worlds will make a very good version of a digital tabletop strategy game. I must admit, though, that whenever a video game like this emerges, I sort of wonder why tabletop-thusiasts would buy it instead of more actual miniatures. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Dune: Awakening is a survival MMO set on the sandy world of Arrakis
    An open-world survival MMO on the lovely beach planet of Dune is exactly what we need in this ever-heating world, right? It’s intriguing then to see Dune: Awakening announced at tonight’s Gamescom Opening Night Live. Walk without rhythm and you’ll get to watch the trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Play What Remains Of Edith Finch before it leaves Game Pass next week
    If you've got Game Pass and haven't yet played What Remains Of Edith Finch, do have a go before it leaves Game Pass on August 31st. First released in 2017, it's a first-person explore-o-story about a teenager returning to her fantastical childhood home to explore lushly detailed rooms and secret passages in the hope of understanding a supposed family curse which causes tragic deaths. And what deaths! You witness many of the Finch family deaths firsthand by playing stunning dreamy vignettes, scenes which are often as wondrous as they are harrowing. Do have a go and enjoy being punched square in the heart by grief. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Razer’s best gaming mouse now has a wireless Pro version
    Razer has just launched an upgraded, fully wireless version of the Basilisk V3 – one of the best gaming mice on the market. The Basilisk V3 Pro can connect over Bluetooth or Razer’s HyperSpeed 2.4Hz wireless standard, and with a few optional extras, will also work with wireless charging and a (theoretically) more responsive 4000Hz polling setting. That's a pretty tricked-out peripheral, yeah? Read more  ( 16 min )
    Head to a tropical paradise in Final Fantasy 14's 6.2 Buried Memory update today
    Fancy a holiday? Well, uber MMO Final Fantasy 14’s free 6.2 Buried Memory update arrives today, providing the opportunity to jet off to your very own tropical island sanctuary. It’s all very Stardew Valley from the look of things, so why not view the brochure by watching the launch trailer below? Read more  ( 16 min )
    No, wait, Saints Row is filled with bizarre bugs after all
    I feel a bit deceived by Saints Row at the moment. Although I spent the latter half of last week playing and performance testing it, the worst I saw in terms of bugs, glitches and unintentional chicanery was one temporarily floating pedestrian and a few de-synced execution animations. Only after I committed this clean(ish) bill of health to writing did the game’s wider playerbase discover that it is, in fact, riddled with issues: some benign and hilarious, others irritating and game-breaking. Well fine then, game. Some of these bug reports have come from inside the house, namely Liam and Rebecca, whose respective characters have a) involuntarily shot out their own windscreen immediately upon entering every single car and b) fallen through the world when attempting to mount a motorcycle. Then there’s former vid bud Colm (RPS in peace), who has found his feet pinned to a car roof before fading away like Marty McFly if his parents split up. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Mount & Blade 2: Bannerlord charges out of Steam early access in October
    Horse-rush action RPG Mount & Blade 2: Bannerlord launches on October 25th following a two-year-long early access period. It’s journeying onto consoles at the same time, too, but its 1.0 release isn't going to be the end of the road for Bannerlord. Devs TaleWorlds Entertainment say they’ll continue to update it in “the coming months” after launch, although in what capacity they haven't said yet. In any case, have a watch Bannerlord's sweeping launch trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Wartime RTS Men Of War 2 has a trailer for a trailer
    A teaser trailer for inbound World War 2 strategy Men Of War 2 has been released that promises a full reveal on September 1st. Hey, it’s actually pretty tense too. Get the advance intel by watching the trailer’s trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Cycle: Frontier season 2 goes spelunking on a new map this September
    Free-to-play extraction shooter The Cycle: Frontier is heading underground for its upcoming The Depths Of Tharis Island expansion, arriving in the game with the start of season two on September 28th. The new map brings a network of enemy-filled caves stuffed with loot to find. Pop on your helmet and grab your pickaxe to watch the trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Nexon's looter-shooter The First Descendant heads into beta in October
    Nexon's free-to-play co-op shooter The First Descendant announced itself with a shooty teaser trailer last month, and now it’s back with another look at the game’s colossal bosses in all their Unreal Engine 5 glory. You’ll be able to take a crack at them yourself when the closed beta begins on October 20th, making this one of the . For now, though, wander moodily away from the camera before leaping into action to watch the latest trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    A Year Of Springs dev npckc "never planned" on making games, but wanted to tell kinder LGBTQ+ stories
    To call the current state of the world today ‘tumultuous’ would be a bit of an understatement. For LGBTQ+ people - and trans people in particular - the increasingly extreme rhetoric and legislation being weaponised against these communities can feel all-consuming. Yet it comes at a time when diverse representation in media, including games, is improving. As the number of characters stated to LGBTQ+ grows, what is more effective representation: making it possible to see your own experiences on screen, or make those experiences understandable to someone who isn't LGBTQ+? People who know of it would perhaps cite the work of developer and translator npckc, who I recently spoke with at the recent Japanese indie gaming event Bitsummit. They were there to showcase their latest game A Pet Shop After Dark, a departure from visual novels like A Year Of Springs trilogy into horror storytelling ("more spooky than outright horror," as they later clarified) that's set to release later this month. Beyond the trilogy and their newest work, they’ve translated the works of other developers and worked on other smaller games and game jam projects. Read more  ( 22 min )
    Liveblog: Gamescom Opening Night Live 2022
    Gamescom returns tonight, both as an in-person event and by way of its Opening Night Live showcase. Just like last year, Opening Night Live 2022 looks set to be Summer Game Fest-style marathon of brand new game reveals and unseen trailers, hosted by Geoff “Among Us DLC” Keighley. This year, we’re also liveblogging the whole thing here on RPS. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Frontier talk the future of Elite Dangerous and its controversial Odyssey expansion
    The last year or so of Elite Dangerous has been the most dramatic since the game launched in 2014. The most recent update to Frontier Developments' epic space sim, Update 13, saw the conclusion of the story's Azimuth Saga, culminating in a disastrous attempt to stop the incursion of the Thargoids – Elite's hostile race of insectoid aliens. It's an event that has already had a major impact on Elite's universe, and Frontier are excited to discuss the studio's plans for the game and its narrative as it pushes into a new phase for the galaxy, simply known as "Aftermath". But the drama surrounding Elite Dangerous isn't limited to the game's overarching story. As I gear up to chat with lead game designer Luke Betterton and senior producer Samantha Marsh, the Thargoid in the room is Elite Dangerous: Odyssey. Launched in May last year, Elite's second expansion was, to put it lightly, not well received by Elite's community. Complaints ranged from extensive bugs and performance issues to more fundamental criticisms about the implementation of the expansion's on-foot exploration and FPS combat. Over a year on from release, the expansion still carries a "Mostly Negative" rating on Steam, standing in stark contrast to reviews for vanilla Elite Dangerous (now bundled with its Horizons expansion), which remain firmly positive. Read more  ( 21 min )
    A Rick-less Morty teleports into MultiVersus today
    Dimension hopper Morty Smith debuts in the Warner Bros. licensed brawler MultiVersus today minus his grandpa, super-scientist Rick, who is still expected to arrive sometime during the game’s season one. Morty will wield the plumbus, a weird chicken-leg thing that’s ubiquitous throughout the universe of Rick And Morty. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Steam Deck shipments are going out early for some Q4 reservations
    Valve continue to pump out Steam Decks at a pace that seems surprising even to them. A few weeks after they announced that anyone with an outstanding Steam Deck order would receive their handheld PC sooner than expected, Valve designer Lawrence Yang has tweeted the news that some reservation holders in the Q4 window – as in, with orders scheduled to be fulfilled in Q4 2022 – are being bumped up into the Q3 batch. Like being upgraded to business class at the airport, if Lufthansa suddenly discovered they had a few more planes than they thought. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Cities: Skylines' next DLC will let you create car-free pedestrian zones
    More than any other citybuilder, Cities: Skylines requires deep engagement with its traffic simulation. You can spend an endless number of (very satisfied) hours tweaking your road network to try to fix traffic jams. The next Cities: Skylines expansion might offer an alternative, however. The Plazas & Promenades DLC, announced today, will allow you to create pedestrian streets and zones where cars dare not tread. Find the first trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Total War: Warhammer 3 details 2.0 patch changes ahead of DLC release
    Total War: Warhammer 3 will tomorrow receive a public beta of Immortal Empires, the vast, trilogy-merging game mode. At the same time, it'll also receive a 2.0 update which brings sweeping changes to faction mechanics, the UI, individual units and many bug fixes. Creative Assembly have detailed some of those changes in a new video release today, which you'll find below. Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    Sonic Frontiers release date confirmed, check out the new story trailer
    SEGA has confirmed a November 8 release date for Sonic Frontiers. The confirmation comes out of gamescom 2022 after the date a bit too early. Alongside the news, a story trailer was released, which you can watch below. In Sonic Frontiers, our blue hero is searching for the Chaos emeralds. While on this adventure, he becomes stranded on an ancient island teeming with unusual creatures. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Dead Island 2 is back after eight years of silence with two new trailers and a release date
    Rising from the ashes of 2014 comes word of Dead Island 2 coming to consoles, PC and Stadia in February 2023. Per publisher Deep Silver and developer Dambuster Studios, you can pick up the long-in-development title on February 3, so mark your calendars. Check out the CGI trailer below, starring Jacob, one of the playable characters. Read more  ( 17 min )
    New Tales from the Borderlands revealed at gamescom Opening Night Live
    New Tales from the Borderlands has had a new trailer shown off during Gamescom Opening Night Live. The game, which was previously leaked, will release on October 21 for PlayStation, Xbox, PC, and Switch. A new standalone title that follows the same narrative-focused gameplay introduced with the original 2014 Tales from the Borderlands created by Telltale Games, the game takes us back to the world of Borderlands with its unique humorous style, aesthetic, and comical violence returning in force. The game will put us in the shoes of three distinct new characters — Anu the scientist, her streetwise brother Octavio, and food service worker Fran. These characters will have to make their way through the world of Promethea while Tediore — a gun manufacturer with guns and spaceships galore — come to the planet in search of a hidden vault. Classic Borderlands premise. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Destiny 2 showcase recap: Destiny 2: Lightfall, Season of Plunder, Epic partnership and no more sunsetting!
    With the Destiny 2 showcase stream, we’ve gotten a new trailer for the upcoming Lightfall expansion through a sick new cinematic trailer, new details on Season 18, and info on improving the new player experience. It was a giant show — with loads to see! While Destiny 2: Lightfall releasing on February 28, 2023 is the biggest news (you can watch this new trailer below!), we’ve wrapped up everything discussed in the Destiny 2 showcase recap below! Callus and his Shadow Legion army are pumped up with darkness powers from the Witness, and laying siege to Neomuna — a giant new city hidden on Neptune. There, we’ll fight off this new force with the help of Cloud Striders — protectors of the planet not connected to The Traveller, but able to hold their own nonetheless. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak has sold over 4 million copies
    Capcom has announced another sales milestone for Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak. According to the company, the game has sold over 4 million copies since releasing June 30 for PC and Switch. That's an additional 1 million units since Capcom announced the 3 million milestone on July 13. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Mount and Blade 2: Bannerlord coming to PlayStation and Xbox consoles in October
    TaleWorlds Entertainment announced today that Mount and Blade 2: Bannerlord will be released on PlayStation and Xbox consoles in October. Developed as a multi-platform game since day one, the console version has the same gameplay features as the PC version. You can pre-order starting today to prepare for the game's full release on October 25. Currently available in Early Access on PC, it too will move to a full release on the same date. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Nexon's action-RPG shooter The First Descendant heads to beta in October
    Nexon has released a new trailer and provided a beta date for its upcoming free-to-play third-person co-operative looter-shooter, The First Descendant. You can try The First Descendant for yourself in a Steam beta scheduled for October 20-26. The Steam beta will start Thursday, October 20 at midnight PT, 3am ET, 8am UK, and runs until Wednesday, October 26 at 11:59pm PT, 2:59am ET, 7:59am UK (October 27). The upcoming beta will have a total of 10 playable characters from which to choose. Nexon said character class details are coming at a later date. Read more  ( 16 min )
    PlayStation VR 2 coming in early 2023, says Sony
    Sony has provided a release window for PlayStation VR 2, and it looks like we can expect it early next year. MSony and PlayStation provided the early 2023 window across multiple social media channels. The next iteration of the PSVR headset will feature 4K HDR visuals, new controllers and multiple games compatible with PlayStation 5. Read more  ( 15 min )
    MultiVersus has attracted over 20 million folks itching for a fight between superheroes and cartoon characters
    Warner Bros. Games and developer Player First Games have announced MultiVersus, the free-to-play fighter that pits superheroes and cartoon characters against each other, has surpassed over 20 million players since the open beta started July 26. The milestone follows the kickoff of MultiVersus Season 1, which began August 15 with a new Battle Pass. The season will also bring a new variety of characters like Morty Smith (Rick and Morty), who will join today. Later in the season, Black Adam (DC), Stripe (Gremlins), and Rick Sanchez (Rick and Morty) will join the roster. Read more  ( 15 min )
    "I want it now!" What do hardcore fighting game players think after hands-on with Street Fighter 6?
    VsFighting X, the 10th instalment of the UKs biggest fighting game event made its glamorous return this past weekend in the heart of central Birmingham. Walk past all the construction through the doors of the Millenium Point venue and excited crowds of competitors and spectators dominated the space. However, as brilliant as the tournament itself was, one of the most popular attractions was Street Fighter 6 on the 2nd floor. With a crowd of eager players larger than even some of the titles with their own dedicated tournament space, four monitors of the version 1.0 build quickly became a hot spot for every attendee. The game, as you may have noticed if you’ve been following it since its announcement, has a lot of hype around it as all mainline Street Fighter titles have had in the past. While the opinions of many influencers and press outlets are out in the wild — including our own impressions of the game — this was a great opportunity to find out what your typical gamer thinks of the next big thing flying out the doors of Capcom. To find out, I made the journey out to Birmingham to get the consensus. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Sonic Frontiers ad prematurely reveals November 8 release date out of nowhere
    Sonic Frontiers appears to be releasing on November 8, as per a now-removed ad uploaded to YouTube. It seems that someone behind the scenes was really living that “gotta go fast” mindset — publishing a trailer was ahead of schedule. As for when this trailer was meant to go live, it’s possible that the release date was intended to be shown off at the Gamescom Opening Night Live show later today. The upcoming open world Sonic title that we’ve been seeing more and more of over recent months has been receiving a mixed reception from fans since we first laid eyes on it. Although the trailer was swiftly taken down, Sonic fans are some of the quickest out there, meaning a back-up was saved and uploaded to Twitter courtesy of quick-on-the-draw user Shaikh Sehran. In it, we see a brief 30 seconds of Sonic racing through different environments present in the open world, as well as taking on some absolutely massive enemies towering overhead. Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    Se alla (?) trailers från Gamescom-showen!
    Patrick Söderlunds nya, Dead Island 2, ny PS5-gamepad, med mera!  ( 16 min )
    Dead Island 2 - blodig gameplay-premiär och releasedatum (äntligen!)
    Inte för känsliga - det är brutalt blodigt.  ( 6 min )
    Se snygga Atlas Fallen - som om Star Wars fått barn med Horizon
    Kommer till pc och next-gen.  ( 6 min )
    Return to Monkey Island har releasedatum!
    Mindre än en månad bort!!  ( 6 min )
    Dualsense Edge avtäckt - Playstation 5-kontroll med massa extra funktioner
    PS5:ans svar på Xbox Elite-kontrollen?  ( 7 min )
    Dualsense Edge - Playstation 5-kontrollen som motsvarar Xbox Elite-gamepaden
    Konfigurerbar kontroll på gång.  ( 6 min )
    Första titten på GTA-mannen Benzies nya - Everywhere
    Men vad är det för spel..?  ( 6 min )
    Sony har börjat jobba på en Gravity Rush-film
    Men blir det live action eller animerat?  ( 6 min )
    Nej, Ubisoft utvecklar inte ett Blade-spel
    Ryktena ska enligt dem själva inte stämma.  ( 6 min )
    Bloomberg bekräftar: Knights of the Old Republic-remaken har bytt utvecklare
    Ryktena ska tydligen stämma.  ( 6 min )
    FZ Play - Saints Row och Gamescom!
    Dubbeltrubbel i afton! Vi börjar kl. 18 och fortsätter kl. 20.  ( 6 min )
    Embracer-aktien sjunker efter svala Saints Row-betyg
    Blandat mottagande och mellanmjölkigt betygssnitt.  ( 6 min )
    Återvändande WoW-spelare får Shadowlands-expansionen gratis
    Du har knappt två veckor på dig att paxa den.  ( 7 min )
    Quake Champions
    Ett Quake för nutiden som alldeles för få har upptäckt.  ( 9 min )
    Klart! Mount & Blade 2: Bannerlord släpps till pc och konsol i oktober
    Olander jublar.  ( 6 min )
    Snart slutar Project Cars och Project Cars 2 att säljas
    På grund av licenser som går ut.  ( 6 min )
    Ett äventyrsspel baserat på Tintin-albumet Faraos cigarrer är på väg
    Tintin Reporter - Cigars of the Pharaoh släpps nästa år.  ( 6 min )
    Dice jobbar på att introducera klasser till Battlefield 2042
    Men specialisterna kommer att finnas kvar.  ( 6 min )
    Playstation VR2 släpps tidigt 2023, bekräftar Sony
    Dags att börja VR-säkra spelrummet.  ( 7 min )
    Sony bekräftar att PSVR2 släpps tidigt nästa år
    Dags att börja VR-säkra spelrummet.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Long-awaited Dead Island 2 reveal headlines Gamescom announcement frenzy
    Also: Homeworld 3, Return to Monkey Island, and a car that connects to Pokemon games.  ( 6 min )
    Scanning students’ homes during remote testing is unconstitutional, judge says
    Ohio judge says room scans could form a slippery slope to more illegal searches.  ( 6 min )
    Sony enters the high-end custom controller arena with the DualSense Edge
    Also: The PlayStation VR2 gets a release window at long last.  ( 6 min )
    Devs are making progress getting macOS Ventura to run on unsupported, decade-old Macs
    Widening gap between supported and unsupported hardware makes things tricky.  ( 7 min )
    Twitter whistleblower claims Musk was right about bots; FTC reviewing report
    Twitter’s former security chief alleges execs hid security risks from regulators.  ( 6 min )
    Unix legend, who owes us nothing, keeps fixing foundational AWK code
    Co-creator of core Unix utility, now 80, just needs to run a few more tests.  ( 5 min )
    China’s official view of NASA’s Artemis program appears to be dismissive
    "NASA might grow more hostile against China in the space domain."  ( 5 min )
    Lightweight Linux laptop crams a 99 Wh battery inside
    Tuxedo Computers' InfinityBook Pro 14 is only 0.6-inches thick and 2.9 pounds.  ( 6 min )
    Some Google products will disable “Hey, Google” commands during meetings
    Google Meet Hardware knows you're in a meeting, so it will disable the hotword.  ( 5 min )
    We’re loving the lavish epic visuals in the new LOTR: Rings of Power trailer
    "Choose not the oath of fear, but that of faith."  ( 6 min )
    Does turning the air conditioning off when you’re not home save energy?
    Engineers ran the numbers, and the answer varies.  ( 7 min )
    The SLS rocket is the worst thing to happen to NASA—but maybe also the best?
    "This has been a really tough thing."  ( 6 min )
    Computers vs. TV: Which is less likely to promote dementia?
    When it comes to health issues, not all forms of being sedentary are equal.  ( 6 min )
    With data in mice, Pfizer asks FDA to authorize its fall BA.4/5 booster shot
    The request is partly based on preclinical data. A clinical trial has yet to start.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Sony DualSense Edge Wireless Controller Arrives With PC-Like Customizations
    Sony is introducing a new controller for the PS5, the DualSense Edge, to provide gamers more customization options than the original DualSense.  ( 62 min )
    Asus Teases ROG Crosshair X670E Gene For Zen 4 CPUs
    Asus shows off the ROG Crosshair X670E Gene motherboard for Zen 4 CPUs.  ( 59 min )
    Gigabyte Unveils 4-Way PCIe 5.0 SSD Adaptor With Up to 60 GBps
    If one PCIe 5.0 x4 drive is not enough, four may be just what you want. Gigabyte's Aorus Gen5 AIC adapter can reach speeds of up to 60 GBps.  ( 59 min )
    Asus Releases ROG Swift PG42UQ and PG48UQ OLED Gaming Monitors
    4K OLED panels are G-Sync compatible, offer deep blacks, wide color gamut, up to 138 Hz refresh rates, and 0.1ms response times for immersive fast-paced gaming.  ( 63 min )
    LeapFive NB2 is a New RISC-V Processor
    Chinese manufacturer LeapFive has revealed the NB2, its RISC-V processor with a GPU on board.  ( 59 min )
    Steam Deck Production Outperforming Expectations as Q4 Reservations Move to Q3
    One of Valve's employees unexpectedly announced more Q4 reservations for the Steam Deck are being transferred to Q3, with production outperforming expectations.  ( 59 min )
    Akko ACR Pro Alice Plus Review: An Affordable Split Layout
    The Akko ACR Pro Alice Plus is a mainstream interpretation of the highly coveted Alice layout that features a fantastic gasket-mount design and a boat load of accessories.  ( 66 min )
    Bursting PC Inventories Might Stoke Aggressive Discounts and Promotions
    It would be natural to see downward pricing pressure due to such large inventories, but some PC makers are confident they can use 80-90% of their PC ICs and components in next-gen PCs.  ( 59 min )
    AMD's Ryzen 5 7600X Available on Chinese Flea Market
    You can order an engineering sample of AMD's Ryzen 5 7600X online.  ( 59 min )
    SteelSeries Arctis Nova 7 Wireless Review: Like the Nova Pro...but not as good
    The Arctis Nova 7 Wireless has been redesigned to look like the Arctis Nova Pro Wireless, with a fully-retractable mic, simultaneous dual-wireless connectivity, and new speaker drivers that...could be better.  ( 66 min )
    SteelSeries Arctis Nova 1 Review: Wired but Worth It
    The Arctis Nova 1 is a slim, lightweight, comfortable analog headset, and it costs just $60.  ( 67 min )
    SteelSeries Arena Wireless Mic Review: Works with speakers (but that’s it)
    The Arena Wireless Mic is a wireless, on-ear mic designed to work with speakers (which it does, very well), but it’s pretty expensive for such a specific product.  ( 66 min )
    Arctic Announces Service Kit For Defective Liquid Freezer 2 AIOs
    Arctic has released a free service kit for all owners of defective Liquid Freezer II AIOs, featuring a bad gasket. The service kit allows users to replace the gasket at their location, keeping system downtime low.  ( 59 min )
  • Open

    NVIDIA Vulkan Beta Driver 515.49.14 out now
    NVIDIA has released the latest update to their special Vulkan Beta Driver, for developers and users who want to test out the very-latest stuff.  ( 4 min )
    Hearts of Iron IV - By Blood Alone set to release on September 27th
    After being announced back in June, we now actually have a release date for the latest Hearts of Iron IV expansion from Paradox with By Blood Alone coming on September 27th.  ( 5 min )
    Total War: WARHAMMER III 2.0 out with Immortal Empires, Linux update 'as soon as possible'
    Creative Assembly and SEGA have announced the massive Total War: WARHAMMER III 2.0 patch which comes along with a Beta version of Immortal Empires.  ( 5 min )
    ProtonUp-Qt for easy GE-Proton installs on Linux and Steam Deck v2.7.0 out now
    ProtonUp-Qt is a simple and great way to manage the likes of GE-Proton (previously known as Proton GE), the Luxtorpeda compatibility tool for Native Linux game engines and more.  ( 4 min )
    GOG have a huge sale going with giveaways, flash deals
    GOG are making a big splash with "The GOG Sale" which is live now until September 5th, 10 PM UTC. Time to pick up a bunch of DRM free goodies?  ( 4 min )
    Steam Deck production better than expected, Q4 emails already going out
    Valve has confirmed that production of the Steam Deck has gone better than expect, and so even more (yes again) people will be seeing their emails to purchase one.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Subnautica dev unveils "analogue" turn-based tactics game Moonbreaker
    After two games of terrifying deep sea survival, Subnautica developer Unknown Worlds is heading in a very different direction for its next project - a heavily tabletop-inspired turn-based tactics game, titled Moonbreaker, that'll be entering Steam early access on 29th September. On a fundamental level, Moonbreaker, which has been in development for around five years, is surprisingly straightforward; each game sees players - either working against a human or AI opponent - strategising their way around the board, using careful positioning to their advantage as they work to annihilate the opposing player's Captain. So far so straightforward, but the complexity arrives when you begin factoring in the tactical options available to players each turn, which include the likes of cover - which is either impenetrable or penetrable but at the cost of accuracy - plus Captains, crew members, ship assists, and resource management. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Everything announced at Gamescom 2022 Opening Night Live
    Gamescom 2022 Opening Night Live is finished! In case you missed any or all of the two hour(!) long show, here's everything announced during the broadcast, including all the trailers. ONL kicked off with a new trailer for Everywhere, the next game from the studio founded by Leslie Benzies, ex-boss of Grand Theft Auto maker Rockstar North. It looks a bit Fortnite, a bit Roblox, a bit... metaverse? Everywhere should be out at some point in 2023. Moving on! Level Infinite announced Dune Awakening, an open world survival MMO in the works at Funcom. The cinematic trailer is below. Read more  ( 18 min )
    The Surge developer unveils Atlas Fallen
    Atlas Fallen is a new fantasy action RPG from The Surge developer Deck 13, set for release on PC, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S in 2023. We got a first look at Atlas Fallen tonight during Gamescom Opening Night Live, via a flashy CGI trailer which shows off its sand-covered semi-open world and superpowered beasties. Stick with the trailer - not that it isn't easy on the eyes - and there's a glimpse of what looks like actual gameplay right at the end. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Hideo Kojima launching new Spotify podcast Brain Structure next month
    Hideo Kojima - the man behind the likes of Death Stranding, Metal Gear Solid, and PT - has once again popped up at the German Geoffs (AKA Gamescom Opening Night Live) for a bit of the old self-promotion, this time to announce a new podcast series known as Brain Structure. Brain Structure, which will launch as a Spotify exclusive starting in September, appears to be seperate from Kojima's Japan-only Radioverse podcast, which began in February and promised to bring listeners a variety of guests discussing "deep topics related to games and movies that cannot be heard anywhere else". This new Spotify podcast seems broadly similar in nature though, featuring appearances from "very special guests from various fields", including, perhaps inevitably, Geoff Keighely, who'll have his own regular entertainment news section. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Medieval China-set action RPG Where Winds Meet announced
    Brand new game Where Winds Meet was announced at Gamescom Opening Night Live. The game is from developer Everstone Games and is an open world action RPG set in the Ten Kingdoms period of medieval China. The game was revealed with a stunning looking trailer that showed off its lush setting of bamboo forests, snow covered mountains, and other surreal areas. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Dead Island 2 aims to be the "goriest game out there"
    The last time we here at Eurogamer previewed Dead Island 2 was way back in 2014 when I went hands on with a playable demo at Gamescom. At that time the game was being developed by Yager Development, but when that studio was removed from the project in 2015, Sumo Digital took over and attempted to pick up the pieces. Sumo's involvement was short lived though and it was also taken off development sometime around 2019. After that, Dambuster Studios took up the reins and since then all has been worringly quiet. I'm sure I'm not the only person out there who thought that this troubled sequel was dead in the water but surprise, surprise, not only has Dead Island 2 risen from the grave in true zombie fashion, but it also has an actual, set in stone release date. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Peaceful puzzler Dorfromantik coming to Switch in September
    Dorfromantik, the peaceful puzzle game from German developer Toukana Interactive, is coming to Nintendo Switch next month. The game has already proven popular on Steam and will hit Nintendo's console on 29th September. To celebrate the launch, a new cherry blossom themed biome with unique architecture and scenery will be added. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Gotham Knights release date shifts forwards slightly
    Batman spin-off Gotham Knights got a fresh showing at Gamescom Opening Night Live this evening, with a new trailer and a new release date. Flashy footage from the game gave us our first proper look at Harley Quinn, who looks to be a major antagonist for Gotham Knights' four heroes, alongside Mr Freeze, Clayface and the Court of Owls. The trailer concluded with the reveal of a new launch date: 21st October, four days earlier than previously planned. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Here's a look at The Expanse: A Telltale Series, 2023 release window confirmed
    At Gamescom Opening Night Live, Telltale gave us a closer look at The Expanse: A Telltale Series. Along with this new teaser, which also comes with some behind the scenes chat with actress Cara Gee and the game's development team, we now also have a release window - summer 2023. So, without further ado, here is the new teaser for you all to enjoy. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Talking to the former Fallout 76 lead about their new studio and occult RPG Wyrdsong
    Jeff Gardiner, a Bethesda veteran of 15 years and most recently the project lead on Fallout 76, has announced a new studio and open-world occult RPG with it. The studio is Something Wicked Games and the project is Wyrdsong, pronounced "weirdsong", or at least that's how Gardiner pronounced it on a phone call to me. It's going to be set in Portugal around the forming of the Knights Templar. Something Wicked was co-founded with Obsidian veteran Charles Staples in April this year, who led design on Outer Worlds. And the studio is funded by NetEase courtesy of a $13.2m "seed" investment, which means it's not all the money Something Wicked will need but a wadge to get going with. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Sonic Frontiers confirmed for a November release in new story trailer
    Sonic Frontiers will be released across all platforms on 8th November this year. A new story trailer for the game was shown at the Gamescom Opening Night Live, despite the release date leaking before the show. And that trailer has it all: giant robots, cute companion robots, creepy young child robots, and the return of Amy Rose who appears to have been kidnapped. Check it out below. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Funcom's open-world survival MMO Dune: Awakening gets first trailer
    Funcom has released a first cinematic trailer for Dune: Awakening, a new "open-world survival MMO" inspired by Frank Herbert's novels and Denis Villeneuve's Academy Award-winning film, that's heading to PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC. Dune: Awakening was first teased back in 2019, when Funcom announced it had signed a deal with Legendary Studios to make "at least" three games set in Frank Herbert's Dune universe. One of those eventually turned out to be Dune: Spice Wars and the other, described as an "open-world multiplayer game" from Funcom Oslo, we can now call Dune: Awakening. Today's announcement doesn't bring any gameplay, but Funcom says it'll combine the "grittiness and creativity of survival games with the social interactivity of large-scale, persistent multiplayer games" in a "vast and seamless Arrakis shared by thousands of players". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Return to Monkey Island gets September release date
    At Gamescom Opening Night Live, it was revealed that Return to Monkey Island will be coming to Nintendo Switch and PC on 19th September. That's 'Talk like a pirate day', me hearties. You can preorder the game now, and in doing so get yourself some new horse armour for your piratical inventory. Guys! It's only a month away! Eek! Read more  ( 15 min )
    Here is some more gore from The Callisto Protocol
    Ahead of its release this December, we have been given another, gory, teaser for The Callisto Protocol. Debuted at Gamescom Opening Night Live, this new footage is as bloody and unpleasant as you would expect. There are mutations getting shoved into rotors, there is blood splattering the surfaces left, right and centre, and there are those kinds of noises that you do not want to ever hear when you are home alone at night (or any time for that matter). As well as the standard shooting and squelching, we also get to see some Tomb Raider-esque slipping and sliding down a water way. Of course, there are things to avoid, so this can only end well... See what you think to it all for yourself below. Read more  ( 15 min )
    New Tales from the Borderlands coming this October
    Following on from a leak earlier this month, Gearbox has officially unveiled its upcoming game, New Tales from the Borderlands. As we sort of already knew, it is coming on 21st October across Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PlayStation 5, PS4, Nintendo Switch and PC (via Steam and Epic). This standalone, choice based, narrative is set in the "perpetually war-torn Promethea" and will see players deciding the fates of "three underdogs out to make mayhem in their business". And what of these underdogs? Well, they are altruistic scientist Anu (pictured above), her ambitious "streetwise" brother Octavio, and the fierce, frogurt-flinging Fran. You can see the trailer, which was shown during Gamescom Opening Night Live, for New Tales from the Borderlands below. Read more  ( 15 min )
    PlayStation announces DualSense Edge controller with removable thumbsticks
    Sony has confirmed its previously-rumoured "pro" controller, officially named the DualSense Edge Wireless Controller. A brief teaser for the pad appeared tonight during Gamescom Opening Night Live, and showcased its removable analogue stick units and rear buttons. No release information or pricing details have yet been confirmed, but we'll keep an eye out for Sony to firm up more details soon. Read more  ( 14 min )
    The Lords of the Fallen reboot announced
    A spiritual successor to Lords of the Fallen was announced at tonight's Opening Night Live at Gamescom with a new cinematic trailer. Now with a The at the start, The Lords of the Fallen will continue the dark fantasy Soulslike RPG legacy of the original 2014 game, taking place a thousand years later. Most notably, the game will have a two-player uninterrupted online co-op option. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Ex-GTA producer reveals new game Everywhere
    Scottish developer Build A Rocket Boy has announced its new game Everywhere at Gamescom's Opening Night Live. The studio was set up by former Grand Theft Auto producer Leslie Benzies, with other industry veterans recently joining. Everywhere "seamlessly blends gameplay, adventure, creativity, and discovery in an all-new multiworld gaming experience that redefines how players connect with one another and the digital world around them," reads a press release. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Destiny 2's Neptune-set Lightfall expansion launches February 2023
    Bungie has given Destiny 2's long-awaited Lightfall expansion its first proper reveal, sharing a huge heap of gameplay details - from its Neptune setting to its new grapple-hook-like Strand ability - ahead of its now-confirmed launch date of 28th February next year. Lightfall, which was initially announced back in June 2020, will be Destiny 2's penultimate expansion, coming between this year's The Witch Queen and the game's finale expansion The Final Shape. As such, Bungie is calling it the "beginning of the end", and it continues an escalating narrative that will bring Destiny's Light and Darkness Saga to a close. It finally gives a name and a face to Destiny 2's much-teased big bad, The Witness, and will take players to Neptune's capital city. This gleaming metropolis is, thanks to Calus' Shadow Legion, now Cabal-occupied territory, and players will need to deal with their new Pyramid-enhanced tech - including suppression devices, which can diminish Guardians' abilities - plus a new Pyramid unit known as the Tormentor. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Xbox Gamescom booth lists bizarre Pinocchio game Lies of P for Game Pass
    Microsoft's Gamescom booth has demo stations for several upcoming titles apparently coming to Game Pass, as detailed in photos posted to Twitter by Xbox exec Aaron Greenberg. These include Lies of P, a bizarre Pinocchio game that looks a bit like Bloodborne which we've had our eyes on for some time. You can see its logo towards the right of the photo above. Another demo station is for You Suck at Parking. Like Lies of P, there had been no prior indication these were headed to Game Pass. Read more  ( 15 min )
    There's a new Sackboy game in the works
    Ultimate Sackboy is a new LittleBigPlanet spin-off, and it's headed to your mobile phone. An endless runner, the game looks to be a follow-up to Run Sackboy Run! - the PlayStation Vita and mobile game launched back in 2015. While still formally unannounced by Sony, a Google Play listing for Ultimate Sackboy on Android is already visible - though curiously this dates back to June. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Battlefield 2042 overhauls Specialists with new class-like system
    DICE has announced a series of revamps coming to the beleaguered Battlefield 2042, including a rework of the game's unpopular Specialists. In a lengthy blog post, DICE has detailed how it will bring "classes back to Battlefield" by reintroducing the "classic and familiar" Assault, Recon, Support and Engineer as groups in which existing Specialists will sit as "unique sub-classes". Each of these classes will be tweaked to restrict gadget usage, enabling players to "better assess the threat", and assign new class traits. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Twitch allows Partners to stream on rival platforms
    Twitch has updated its Partner Exclusivity policy, meaning streamers can now livestream on multiple platforms - just not simultaneously. Previously, streamers who reach Partner status on the platform were tied to only livestreaming on Twitch. Now Twitch Partners are also able to stream on rival platforms like YouTube and Facebook too, although simulcasting is not allowed there. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Gamescom 2022 Opening Night Live
    Gamescom is back - das ist super! And it kicks off tonight with Geoff Keighley's Opening Night Live from 7pm UK time. And we'll be covering it live, right here, while you watch and chat about it. What are we going to see? Well, Geoff Keighley! And he's promised a bumper load of world premiere trailers for games such as Return to Monkey Island, The Expanse: Telltale Series, The Callisto Protocol and "more than a dozen" more. I wonder if any of those will have dates on? We've also had a leak or two already. A new trailer for Sonic Frontiers popped up this morning before being hastily pulled down again, but not before the internet caught the 8th November release date. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Nintendo livestream to reveal Splatoon 3, Harvestella gameplay
    Nintendo has announced a last-minute livestream to take place this Thursday, 25th August, featuring fresh Splatoon 3 gameplay and a look at Harvestella. Tune in at 5.30pm UK time for a "deep dive" into Splatoon 3's single-player mode plus more details and strategies for this weekend's upcoming Splatfest World Premiere demo. Following that, we'll see "world-first gameplay" for Harvestella, the farming role-playing game being made by Final Fantasy maker Square Enix. Read more  ( 15 min )
    New Tomb Raider Anniversary mod adds Angel of Darkness assets to the game
    A new mod for Tomb Raider Anniversary adds a variety of assets from Angel of Darkness to its successor. The mod in question comes from Raq on Nexxus Mods. Raq has made it so a multitude of items in Anniversary now get an Angel of Darkness makeover. This includes everything from characters to weapons. With this mod in play, you can replace the athletic Lara Croft with Margot Carvier, Angel of Darkness' demure academic from the Louvre's Department of Medieval and Renaissance Studies. Read more  ( 16 min )
    DF Direct Weekly: Is PlayStation Network integration heading to PC?
    DF Weekly reaches its three-quarter-century milestone this week and dominating our discussion is the evidence that Sony may well be planning its own launcher for PC users - possibly unwelcome news in an era where the PC platform is besieged by a wealth of bespoke launchers that nobody really wants to use... but are we looking at this in the wrong way? What if the references found in the Marvel's Spider-Man PC port are actually pointing the way to a closer integration with the PlayStation Network? There's much to commend the idea of properly integrating PlayStation Studios games into the wider PSN 'ecosystem' - and we've seen this level of console/PC integration pay off handsomely on Xbox Live, meaning that PC and console users can form groups and play multiplayer titles together, Achievements/Trophies could also be synchronised, but perhaps the most enticing level of functionality would be the transfer of saves between platforms. Acknowledgement of a PlayStation account already owning the game could lead to (a hushed awe please) cross-buy purchases, or at the very least a good degree of discount. Sony has talked about its commitment to GAAS (games as a service), it has purchased Bungie, who are pledged to remaining a multi-platform games producer, so some mechanism to expand PSN beyond PlayStation alone makes sense for a lot of reasons. With that said, if the primary objective of the exercise is more about circumventing the revenue shares demanded by Steam and the Epic Games Store (Sony's current outlets for its PC wares), we'd not be so impressed. We'd also like to see any PSN integration to be optional rather than mandatory as it is on the some Xbox first-party games, where you can buy them from Steam but you still require an Xbox Live account to play them. The bottom line is that the reveal of any new launcher brings about a collective groan from the PC audience, when there are ways and means to make them actually worthwhile and useful. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Yakuza creator quit Sega because he didn't "want to become CEO"
    Toshihiro Nagoshi has discussed the new project he's working on and the reason for his departure from Sega. Nagoshi, known as the father of the Super Monkey Ball and Yakuza series, left Sega in 2021 after 32 years at the company to join Chinese technology company NetEase. He later announced Nagoshi Studio, a subsidiary under NetEase Games, which would allow him to "do something different". In an interview with German gaming site 4Players, Nagoshi said it had not been creative differences that had led him to leave Sega, but that during his last few years at the company he was promoted to executive and management roles - something he wasn't interested in. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Mount and Blade 2: Bannerlord coming to PlayStation, Xbox this October
    Taleworlds Entertainment has revealed that Mount and Blade 2: Bannerlord - a swords and shields battler with no fantasy elements - will be coming to PlayStation 4, PS5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S on 25th October. In addition to this, and following its stint in early access, the game will also get its full release on PC at the same time. To accompany this news, here is a new trailer for you to enjoy. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Embracer stock price falls following Saints Row reviews
    Disappointing Saints Row reviews have hit publisher Embracer's stock price. Today's launch of the Saints Row reboot has been seen as the first big test for Embracer's AAA studio talent, following the company's enormous and still-ongoing spree of acquisitions over the past couple of years. But yesterday's Saints Row embargo lift was met with a lacklustre response from many outlets. Eurogamer's own review stated the game "won't set the world alight", but noted that it still holds some "pleasant surprises". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Beauty and brutality: how Oliver Frey's art defined a new medium
    To understand why so many games veterans were dismayed at the news that artist Oliver Frey had died this week, you first need to understand the changing face of games media. Frey was one of the founders of Newsfield, the publisher largely responsible for the explosion of gaming magazines in the early 1980s. The company started out publishing a mail order ZX Spectrum games catalogue which quickly evolved into a newsstand magazine called Crash. Other seminal titles, such as Commodore mag Zzap!64 and the Amstrad specific Amtix, soon followed. This was an era when players had virtually no access to information about new games prior to release. No internet rumours, no social media leaks. If it wasn't covered in a magazine, it might as well not exist. Even when a game was covered in their pages there was a good chance it would involve little more than a handful of black and white screenshots. Often, these were literally photographs of the screen, reproduced on grainy paper. Working out what a game actually looked like was a dark art. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Elden Ring's voiceless Goldmask has a voice after all
    It turns out Elden Ring character Goldmask does in fact have a voice line after all. The character is a mere husk of a man with a golden mask on his face. He's so enlightened he doesn't ever speak and instead just points towards the towering Erdtree with a "...". Except, thanks to datamining, he does actually have a voice line hidden away in the Network Test version of the game. Read more  ( 15 min )
    20m brawlers have already battled it out in MultiVersus
    New figures reveal that Warner Bros. has welcomed over 20 million brawlers to MultiVersus, doubling its numbers since the start of August. In an interview with GamesBeat, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment's president David Haddad said: "We had a fantastic first half of the year, really driven by the results of Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga. And we're so excited to get off to such a great start in the second half with MultiVersus. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Masahiro Sakurai shares final Smash Bros Ultimate screenshot
    Super Smash Bros Ultimate director Masahiro Sakurai has shared his final daily screenshot. Since December 2019, Sakurai has been sharing screenshots from the debug version of the game each day. Earlier this month he noted he'd soon be running out of screenshots. Now that day has come. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Disgaea 7 announced for next year
    Disgaea 7 has just been announced by developer Nippon Ichi Software for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 and PS5. First details of the game were published by the PlayStation Japan blog, which also shared a fresh announcement trailer, below. The setting for Disgaea 7 is a world called the Hinomoto Netherworld Cluster, which is heavily inspired by Japanese history and culture. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Sony narrows PlayStation VR2 launch window
    We now have a slightly better idea when PlayStation VR2 will arrive: in "early 2023". A 2023 launch had been speculated based on recent reports eyeing Sony's financial forecast and production pipeline. As for when exactly "early 2023" will mean... Sony is staying schtum for now. We also still have no idea how much the headset itself will cost. Read more  ( 14 min )
    PSA: It's time to remove unauthorised items from your Elden Ring inventory
    PSA: If you have any unauthorised items in your Elden Ring inventory, you may want to get rid of them sharpish. As noted in the latest patch, unauthorised items will be given [ERROR] in the name to identify them, which may lead to a warning or penalty on your account. The game's official Twitter account notes that this process will start "within a few days". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Netflix handled Sandman brilliantly
    There are spoilers for the Netflix adaptation of Sandman ahead. They're not enormous but it's better if you've watched the show before reading this. Have you watched Sandman on Netflix yet? Wes and Bertie won't stop going on about it. But they both come at it from different points of view. Bertie is a newcomer to Sandman whereas Wes is a devoted fan of the comics. So does it do those comics justice, and can a newcomer enjoy it just the same? We mushed Wes and Bertie together to find out. Bertie: I'd heard a lot about Sandman. It's one of those hallowed comics or graphic novels or whatever it is - the point is, I didn't really know. And it seems it's equally hard to get into because the written story doesn't follow a very coherent structure, so when I went into the local comic shop, feeling inspired to read it, I was soon put off by the enormous amount of Sandman I saw, and where to even begin. This Netflix series, then, was the perfect in. Had you read it before you watched it? Read more  ( 14 min )
    Steam Deck production outperforms Valve estimates, as shipping ramps up
    There's good news for some customers waiting to hear more about their Steam Deck reservations. The latest from Valve states production on the handheld PC has "outperformed [the company's] estimates", a result of which has meant that some with "Q4" reservations may well get their deck sooner than expected. Valve's Lawrence Yang tweeted: "Hi all, a few of you may have received an order email for your 'Q4 window' Steam Deck reservation today. This wasn't a mistake! Read more  ( 15 min )
    Sonic Frontiers trailer reveals November release date
    A new Sonic Frontiers trailer has been spotted, with an 8th November release date attached. We were expecting to see more of Sonic Frontiers at Gamescom's Opening Night Live ceremony tonight. Instead, a Japanese trailer briefly popped up this morning - though it has now been pulled offline. Regardless, the internet never forgets. And, as shared by Nibel, the 8th November release date is now out in the wild. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Monster Hunter Rise now sold over 11m copies
    Monster Hunter Rise has now sold over 11m copies across Switch and PC. Recent sales of the game have been driven by a bundle with brand new expansion Sunbreak, Capcom said in a press release. Moreover, Sunbreak alone has sold 4m copies worldwide since its release at the end of June. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Gran Turismo 7's recovery drive continues after its stuttering start
    To say Gran Turismo 7 fluffed its opening moments earlier this year might be understating things a little; this was a getaway as catastrophic as Lewis Hamilton's at the Baku restart last year, Polyphony Digital's high profile PlayStation exclusive careering off-track in a cloud of self-inflicted chaos. The magic button that was the cause of all that drama was in this instance microtransactions, deployed aggressively on launch (and somewhat cynically activated once many of the reviews were already in) and leading to some deserved vitriol from fans. That controversy defined Gran Turismo 7's early days, and in so many ways continues to do so today. Polyphony Digital's initial updates only exacerbated the situation: an early patch nerfed payouts of some key grinding spots players had been exploiting, but most damningly its deployment took the servers down for 24 hours, underlining the madness of a single-player campaign rendered unplayable without an internet connection. The spotlight was on Sony's series for its first numbered outing in almost a decade, and it duly shat itself. Series creator Kazunori Yamauchi's justification for the always online element and the inflated prices was simply maddening. "The pricing of cars is an important element that conveys their value and rarity," he said in the heated aftermath of that early update. "So I do think it's important for it to be linked with the real world prices. I want to make GT7 a game in which you can enjoy a variety of cars lots of different ways, and if possible would like to try to avoid a situation where a player must mechanically keep replaying certain events over and over again." Read more  ( 19 min )
  • Open

    Intel turns to private equity to help pay for new factories
    That $52b CHIPS Act ain't enough – we need another $15b Intel is turning to private equity to bankroll its much-hyped chip foundry expansion.…  ( 6 min )
    FTC presses ahead in its war on 'free' Turbo Tax
    US watchdog snubs Intuit's request to drop claims of bait-and-switch tactics The FTC is pressing ahead with its allegations of false advertising against Turbo Tax maker Intuit after a brief pause in proceedings.…  ( 4 min )
    Intel set to squeeze the flops out of Ponte Vecchio GPU
    Now Intel just needs to ship a compatible CPU Hot Chips  Intel offered the closest glimpse yet at its flagship datacenter GPU, code named Ponte Vecchio, at the Hot Chips conference this week, with its own internal benchmarks showing the chip outperforming AMD’s MI250x and competing head-to-head with Nvidia’s upcoming H100 GPU.…  ( 6 min )
    Smartphone gyroscopes threaten air-gapped systems, researcher finds
    Network interface card LEDs are a risk too by blinking in Morse code An Israeli security researcher known for foiling air gap security measures has published a reminder of just how vulnerable the approaches are to both visual and ultrasonic threats. …  ( 5 min )
    Commercial space station Orbital Reef's design phase passes NASA review
    Ready or not, ISS is coming down in 2031, and Amazon, Boeing and more are ready for business NASA has given the go-ahead for the first commercially owned and operated space station, Orbital Reef, to advance to design phase.…  ( 5 min )
    China's tech juggernauts form metaverse research institute
    Meanwhile, Mark Zuckerberg's Meta spends billions on the concept COMMENT  While Meta has been hemorrhaging billions trying to bring CEO Mark Zuckerberg's metaverse to life with little to show for it, China has decided it too will take a crack at the virtual-reality concept.…  ( 5 min )
    Apple autonomous car engineer pleads guilty to stealing trade secrets
    Top secret tech theft admission sealed into top secret plea deal An ex-Apple engineer who worked on Titan – the company's "need to know basis" self-driving car project – yesterday admitted to stealing proprietary tech while he was working for the company.…  ( 5 min )
    Intel's Gelsinger talks up 'systems foundry' era of trillion-transistor chips
    CEO pledges to 'keep moving Moore's Law forward' during Hot Chips keynote Hot Chips  Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger sees a future where everything is a computer assembled from chiplets using advanced packing technologies like Intel's own as the chipmaker seeks to keep Moore's Law alive.…  ( 5 min )
    Lawsuit accuses Oracle of facilitating sales of 'billions' of folks' personal data
    Privacy case claiming Big Red contravened a string of US laws follows boasts made by Larry Ellison in 2016 Oracle is the subject of a class-action suit alleging the software giant created a network containing personal information of hundreds of millions of people and sold the data to third parties.…  ( 5 min )
    US Army drone crashes hours ahead of breaking flight duration record
    Airbus's solar-powered Zephyr nosedives after more than 64 days aloft An unmanned, solar-powered drone was hours from breaking the world record for the longest-duration flight before it suddenly crashed.…  ( 4 min )
    UK government will not step in over Altice’s growing stake in BT
    Telco billionaire purchase A-OK from national security standpoint, apparently, but will he buy up more? The UK government has declared it will take no further action regarding the purchase of BT shares by French telco billionaire Patrick Drahi, following a national security assessment into his Altice company becoming the largest BT shareholder.…  ( 5 min )
    Universal Unix tool AWK gets Unicode support
    From original author Brian Kernighan, one of the original Unix team In Unix terms, this news is almost akin to Moses appearing and announcing an amendment to the 10 commandments.…  ( 5 min )
    $50m+ contract for crime-fighting IT system won by Fujitsu after no one else bid
    Japanese giant will stop making mainframes four years later Fujitsu has been awarded a renewed contract for support and maintenance of the aging UK Police National Computer (PNC) after no other companies tendered for the work.…  ( 5 min )
    OVH to hike prices, blames 'l'inflation'
    Energy costs are up 40 percent and OVH isn't going to eat that without sharing some pain French cloud company OVH has announced it will hike its prices.…  ( 4 min )
    China cybersecurity regulator wants to support tech growth
    New and friendlier CAC, after years of cracking down The Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) has signaled it would like to smooth growing tensions with internet firms after a couple of years in which it strongly asserted its powers.…  ( 4 min )
    Microsoft finds critical hole in operating system that for once isn't Windows
    Oh wow, get a load of Google using strcpy() all wrong – strcpy! Haha, you'll never ever catch us doing that Microsoft has described a severe ChromeOS security vulnerability that one of its researchers reported to Google in late April.…  ( 5 min )
    If you haven't patched Zimbra holes by now, assume you're toast
    Here's how to detect an intrusion via vulnerable email systems Organizations that didn't immediately patch their Zimbra email systems should assume miscreants have already found and exploited the bugs, and should start hunting for malicious activity across IT networks, according to Uncle Sam.…  ( 5 min )
    NASA identifies landing sites for America's return trip to the Moon
    Hopefully Lucky 13 spots suggested, all on the south pole near water ice The next US astronauts to set foot on the Moon will find themselves on the summit of a mountain range or the ridge of a crater near the lunar south pole.…  ( 5 min )
    W3C's planned transition to HTTPS stymied by legacy laggards
    Timing for plan to redirect HTTP requests now indeterminate to allow for further feedback More than a decade after implementing support for secure HTTPS connections on its website, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is finally planning to begin redirecting insecure HTTP connections to the more protected spec.…  ( 6 min )
    Novant Health admits leak of 1.3m patients' info to Facebook
    But don't worry, Zuck would never misuse this type of sensitive data Novant Health confirmed that it may have disclosed 1.3 million patients' sensitive data, including email addresses, phone numbers, financial information - even doctor's appointment details - to Meta.…  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    AMD's New PMF CPU Linux Driver Now Preparing For "CnQF"
    As I've written about the past several weeks, AMD engineers have been preparing a Platform Management Framework (PMF) driver for Linux. The AMD Platform Management Framework for future hardware appears similar to Intel's Dynamic Platform and Thermal Framework (DPTF) and designed to enhance the thermal/power performance of future platforms...  ( 5 min )
    Wine-Based CrossOver 22 Released For Enjoying Windows Apps & Games On Linux
    CodeWeavers today announced the availability of their Wine-based CrossOver 22 software for enjoying Windows applications and games atop Linux, ChromeOS, and macOS...  ( 5 min )
    Webmin 2.0 Released For Open-Source Web-Based Server Management/Administration
    Webmin as a popular, open-source web-based server administration/management software package that is a popular alternative to the likes of cPanel and Plesk is out with its big "v2.0" release...  ( 5 min )
    Imagination PowerVR Rogue DRM Linux Kernel Driver Out For Review
    Earlier this year was the surprise announcement of Imagination publishing an open-source PowerVR Vulkan driver for Mesa. That driver has since been mainlined in Mesa and the Imagination developers continue working on improving their Vulkan API coverage. Simultaneously they have been working on a proper, upstream-friendly open-source DRM/KMS kernel driver and that code now is far enough along that it's been sent out for initial review...  ( 5 min )
    Sound Open Firmware 2.2.1 Released With Preparations For Intel Raptor Lake
    Sound Open Fimware is already four years old as what started out as Intel pushing for more open firmware around audio DSPs. Since then we've seen Mediatek begin to support "SOF" as well as some AMD hardware supporting Sound Open Firmwar. Out today is SOF 2.2.1 as the latest from this open-source project under the Linux Foundation umbrella...  ( 4 min )
    Firefox 104 Now Available With Minor Improvements
    Mozilla is ready to ship Firefox 104.0 this morning as the latest incremental improvement to this open-source, cross-platform web browser...  ( 5 min )
    Dell Now Preloading Ubuntu 22.04 LTS On New XPS 13 Plus Developer Edition
    Last month Dell announced their new Alder Lake powered XPS 13 Plus Developer Edition laptop was certified by Canonical for Ubuntu 22.04 LTS. At the time though it was still shipping to customers with Ubuntu 20.04 LTS while now Dell has moved to preloading Ubuntu 22.04 LTS directly from the factory...  ( 5 min )
    Flatpak 1.14 Released With Improvements For Sandboxed Linux Apps
    Flatpak 1.14 has been released as the newest feature release for this leading open-source solution for sandboxing and distribution of Linux applications...  ( 4 min )
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    Funny Money
    No content preview
  • Open

    Arctic varnar för problem med kylaren Liquid Freezer II – skickar ut gratis reparationskit
    En felaktig packning i kylarblocket kan orsaka försämrad prestanda och potentiellt vätskeläckage hos bolagets AIO-kylare Liquid Freezer II.  ( 6 min )
    Geforce RTX 4080 uppges bestyckas med GDDR6X-minne som körs i 23 000 MHz
    Utöver snabbare grafikminne talas det om att effektbudgeten för Nvidias kommande kort justeras till 340 W.  ( 6 min )
    Videoreportage: SweClockers besöker Nordens största datorfabrik
    Vad krävs för att bygga 45 000 skräddarsydda datorer per år? Häng med när SweClockers besöker Komplett och upplever datorbyggande i industriell skala.  ( 5 min )
    Playstation VR2 släpps tidigt nästa år
    Sony bekräftar att VR-headsetet Playstation VR2 kommer släppas i början av 2023.  ( 5 min )
    Snabbkoll: Har du mekanisk hårddisk i din primära dator?
    Har du någon mekanisk hårddisk i din dator eller har du helt gått över till SSD-lagring?  ( 5 min )
    Sega Mega Drive Mini 2 släpps den 27 oktober i Europa – 60 medföljande spel listade
    Segas nya minikonsol kommer till Europa i slutet av oktober och får en utökad skara medföljande spel än tidigare utannonserats.  ( 6 min )
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    Untitled
    No content preview  ( 2 min )
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    Comic for 2022.08.23
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )
  • Open

    Ian Jackson: prefork-interp - automatic startup time amortisation for all manner of scripts
    The problem I had - Mason, so, sadly, FastCGI Since the update to current Debian stable, the website for YARRG, (a play-aid for Puzzle Pirates which I wrote some years ago), started to occasionally return “Internal Server Error”, apparently due to bug(s) in some FastCGI libraries. I was using FastCGI because the website is written in Mason, a Perl web framework, and I found that Mason CGI calls were slow. I’m using CGI - yes, trad CGI - via userv-cgi. Running Mason this way would “compile” the template for each HTTP request just when it was rendered, and then throw the compiled version away. The more modern approach of an application server doesn’t scale well to a system which has many web “applications” most of which are very small. The admin overhead of maintaining a daemon, and correspo…

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    Project CARS 1 and 2 will soon be delisted from Steam
    It's sadly not uncommon for racing games to disappear from sale due to expiring licenses. Next for the scrapheap are Project CARS 1 and 2, the simulation racing games from Slightly Mad Studios, which will disappear from sale on October 3rd and September 21st respectively. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Warframe devs tease more details of their free-to-play Soulslike
    Everyone is rightly tired of games being compared to Dark Souls, but I feel like it's allowed in the case of Soulframe. It's being made by Digital Extremes and it trades the science fiction of Warframe for fantasy. Bonfires play a role. There's melee sword combat. What more do you need to know? Well, if the answer is "some more", then there were a handful of extra details in a developer livestream this evening. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Do you agree with NYT's new official Wordle starting word?
    The best Wordle starting word has long been a subject of debate ever since the clever little word-guessing game exploded in popularity the best part of a year ago. But now owners The New York Times have declared a new officially recommended starting Wordle word, and I'm not sure how I feel about. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Nope, Ubisoft are not making a Blade game
    I love it when a bit of internet rumour mongering gets instantly squashed by the powers that be, don't you? This time, it's in relation to a Blade game that Ubisoft are definitely not making. Rumours started circulating online yesterday when a YouTuber posted a video speculating about what possible games will be shown at the Disney and Marvel games showcase taking place next month. Ubisoft making a game based on Marvel's sword-wielding vampire Blade was one of them, and because the internet is the internet, everyone went wild. Today, though, Ubisoft have already killed the rumour dead in a single tweet. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Saints Row PC requirements, performance, and the best settings to use
    Not to paint them as particularly fierce open-world rivals, but jumping into Saints Row after a week spent with Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered felt like being hurled backward in time. While Deep Silver Volition’s “what if millennials, but crime” reboot is colourful and often quite pretty, you can tell it’s not nearly as interested in cutting edge visuals or contemporary PC tech trappings as the Spidey remaster is. Ray tracing? Yes but only for ambient occlusion. Upscaling? Never heard of it, officer. The upside - besides Santo Ileso being a generally nice place to visit, as Alice Bee found in her Saints Row review - is that it's playable on low-end and luxury hardware alike. And, to its credit, there's a healthy list of customisable graphics options too. I’ve therefore embraced the past, and spent hours in testing to find out how you can tweak Saints Row’s settings for the best possible performance. Read more  ( 22 min )
    Saints Row (2022) review: a fun but sadly confused reboot
    The Saints Row series started off as a sort of rival to Grand Theft Auto, an action-adventure crime sim about working your way up the ranks of a street gang to become the boss. It quickly diverged to become less realistic and more impossibly bombastic, and niched down into giant dildo bats, aliens, reincarnation, and so on. The series has gone to outer space and to hell, so if you're rebooting the series that doesn't leave you many places to go except... backwards. Saints Row (2022 edition) is back to being a sort of Saints Row again, but also still trying to appeal to people who loved the characters and dick jokes and cartoon carnage of the Saints Row of 2013. If I was being reductive, I'd say it's Saints Row by way of Watch Dogs 2. It isn't bad. It's fun, in fact, but it isn't really doing anything new, either, and I think that's a shame. Read more  ( 21 min )
    Total War: Warhammer 3's Immortal Empires is an impressive achievement in dedicated grand-strategy creation
    There’s a long-standing theory among the Warhammer community that the chaos wastes at the globe’s south pole house a peculiar breed of beastmen in the form of evil, monstrous penguins. The theory is based on a world with similar geography to our own, and the tendency of the ruinous powers to morph local fauna into mockeries of their previous forms. No ping-gors show themselves as I trawl the southern wastes as stealthy chameleon-skink Oxyotl, but I find myself thinking about them all the same. Noot for the noot god, the blasted crags seem to whisper. Fish for the fish throne. Evil penguins or not, all things seem possible with Immortal Empires, the combined landmass of the Total War: Warhammer trilogy into a single sandbox map, vast and varied in its climates, landmarks, and inhabitants. Creative Assembly have already dug deep into dusty stacks of White Dwarf to flesh out footnotes into full factions, and as the list of obvious additions dwindle, things can only get wilder and more creative. For now, we have one very big map stuffed with each faction and lord from three massive strategy games, creaking and occasionally buckling under the weight of its own promise. But it works. There’s a breadth of technical and balance issues still to solve, but the Immortal Empires beta is substantially more stable, playable, and enjoyable than I dared to hope it would be for at least another six months. Read more  ( 20 min )
    HBO's The Last Of Us TV show gets first official footage
    We've known HBO have been making a TV adaptation of everyone's favourite grim zombie apocalypse The Last Of Us for some time now, but aside from a few leaks and still images, we haven't actually seen it in action yet - until now. Late last night, HBO released the first official footage from the show, showing Pedro Pascal's Joel giving some serious lip to Bella Ramsey's Ellie, as well as a very quick peek at Bill, played by Nick Offerman. Slated to arrive sometime on our tellyboxes next year, have a watch of the trailer below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Tower Of Fantasy players have more freebies on the way after major Nemesis bugs
    Tower Of Fantasy developers Hotta Studio have announced that players of their free-to-play gacha MMO will be getting another free compensation package later today, after a "serious malfunction" regarding one of its top tier characters, Nemesis. The issue was first spotted in the early hours of this morning, which prevented players from participating in a time-limited event known as Rebirth Of Clemency and rolling for new items and characters. Hotta Studio have assured players it should all be sorted now, though, and that they can expect to receive their next bundle of freebies in the coming hours. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Screenshot Saturday Mondays: spin attacks and a rattling railbus
    Every weekend, indie devs show off current work on Twitter's #screenshotsaturday tag. And every Monday, I bring you a selection of these snaps and clips. This week, my eye was caught by several games with flashy spin attacks, a lovely ride on a rattling railbus, swearing at geese, and plenty more interesting indies. Come admire them with me! Read more  ( 17 min )
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    How to make HomeKit see more of your gadgets with Home Assistant
    Tiny server can unlock greater powers in not only HomeKit, but Google and Alexa.  ( 6 min )
    Once again, Apple calls workers back to the office—once again, workers fight back
    An internal petition says individual teams should set remote-work policies.  ( 6 min )
    Review: House of the Dragon prequel series makes a solid debut
    Pilot can't quite escape the shadow of Game of Thrones, but it's eminently watchable.  ( 5 min )
    Intel leans on more E-cores for performance boosts in leaked 13th-gen CPU lineup
    E-cores in desktop CPUs have proven handy for big multi-threaded workloads.  ( 6 min )
    YouTube kicks off podcast strategy with new landing page
    New page highlights popular podcast episodes and playlists.  ( 5 min )
    Smartphone demand drops for all but the most expensive models
    Inflation, lockdowns, and a sense of sameness hurt global smartphone demand.  ( 5 min )
    Fauci to step down in December; Biden extends “deepest thanks”
    Fauci, 81, has advised seven presidents on infectious disease threats.  ( 5 min )
    VESA wants to replace monitor response time specs with ‘ClearMR’ stamps
    ClearMR spec grants monitors, TVs, & more with a number representing motion blur performance.  ( 7 min )
    Apple expands self-service repair program to M1 MacBooks
    Apple will sell and rent parts and tools for M1 Mac laptop repairs.  ( 4 min )
    Saints Row game review: An open-world mess beyond redemption
    A "reboot" that doesn't even surpass open-world GTA-like games of the late '00s.  ( 6 min )
    For its latest images, the Webb telescope looked closer to home
    "We hadn't really expected it to be this good, to be honest."  ( 5 min )
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    Hiding a phishing attack behind the AWS cloud
    Scammers are using cloud services to create and host web pages that can be used to lure victims into handing over their credentials Criminals are slipping phishing emails past automated security scanners inside Amazon Web Services (AWS) to establish a launching pad for attacks.…  ( 6 min )
    Java libraries are riddled with deserialization security holes
    There is a madness to the methods Boffins at universities in France, Germany, Luxembourg, and Sweden took a deep dive into known Java deserialization vulnerabilities, and have now resurfaced with their findings. In short, they've drawn attention to the ways in which libraries can accidentally introduce serious security flaws.…  ( 6 min )
    Mexico joins the list of nations wanting to lure chipmakers
    Washington, Seoul, Beijing, Taipei and ...Mexico City battle to attract vendors Mexico is the next country in line to offer incentives to tempt semiconductor manufacturers to set up shop, and may be aiming to take advantage of the US desire to bring manufacturing closer to home.…  ( 5 min )
    Windows 10 update breaks audio for some systems
    Here's your latest excuse to miss that Zoom meeting Another Windows update, another Windows problem. Microsoft has admitted that a July update for Windows 10 may have broken audio for some users. …  ( 5 min )
    Apple adds M1 Mac notebooks to self-repair scheme
    For 'limited, serial number-authorized repairs' in move unlikely to appease critics Loyal Mac fans inclined to break out the WD-40 and duct tape when their trusted devices misbehave now have access to an official Apple Self Service Repair program.…  ( 4 min )
    LockBit gang hit by DDoS attack after threatening to leak Entrust ransomware data
    Prolific group pummeled days after claiming to be file thief behind attack on cybersecurity vendor The LockBit ransomware group last week claimed responsibility for an attack on cybersecurity vendor in June. The high-profile gang is now apparently under a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) because of it.…  ( 6 min )
    Network congestion algorithms have design flaw, says MIT
    In the battle between bandwidth, latency, and starvation, we'll always be choosing two Trying to create a network that's fair, equitable, and starvation-free may simply be impossible – at least with current congestion control algorithms (CCA), an MIT study has found.…  ( 5 min )
    Korea to attend 'Chip 4' meeting as global doubts mounts over US initiative
    Fellow group member Taiwan claims it never got the invite A South Korean official confirmed on Thursday that the country would attend the preliminary meeting of the so-called international Chip 4. Fellow prospective member, Taiwan, claims it had not been given any details of the event.…  ( 5 min )
    Tencent lines up to deploy Broadcom's co-packaged optical switches
    A faster 51.2Tbit/sec co-packaged switch is also in the works Broadcom will deploy its 25.6Tbit/sec Humbolt co-packaged optical (CPO) switches in China-based cloud provider Tencent's datacenters in a bid to accelerate adoption of the emerging network tech.…  ( 5 min )
    How important are tech and other contractors to UK? PM candidate promises tax review if elected
    Liz Truss to go over IR35 off payroll tax as ruling party voters gear up to pick their leader The leading candidate to replace Boris Johnson as the UK's prime minister has said she would review changes to the IR35 tax rules so often criticized by IT contractors.…  ( 6 min )
    Rocket Lab CEO reflects on company's humble beginnings as a drainpipe
    PowerPoint presentations are all well and good, but for Peter Beck, you can't beat something physical Rocket Lab CEO Peter Beck spoke at the SmallSat 2022 conference and offered up words of wisdom for anyone pondering an entry into the lighter end of the launch market.…  ( 5 min )
    Big Tech is building the metaverse of its own dreams. You don't want to go there
    No country for old menus Opinion  A year ago, corporate VR sucked deep on the hype pipe and offered it around. We weren't convinced. All that investment, all that technology, to recreate a drab pastiche of the very environments we'd gratefully escaped in the magical world of WFH.…  ( 6 min )
    In a time before calculators, going the extra mile at work sometimes didn't add up
    New kid on the block risked decimating colleagues' side hustle Who, Me?  When you start a new job, you always want to impress the boss by going the extra mile (or kilometer). But doing so can risk incurring the wrath of co-workers. …  ( 4 min )
    Lessons to be learned from Google and Oracle's datacenter heatstroke
    It's getting hot in here so take down all your nodes Comment  This year's summer heatwaves aren't just making your average Brit's life a bit miserable, it also caused problems for some cloud providers and server admins trying to keep their gear running.…  ( 8 min )
    Zoom patches make-me-root security flaw, patches patch
    Plus: See if in-app browsers are monitoring you, a novel industrial network attack technique, and more In brief  Zoom fixed a pair of privilege escalation vulnerabilities, which were detailed at the Black Hat conference this month, but that patch was bypassed, necessitating yet another fix.…  ( 7 min )
    NSO Group CEO steps down, 100 employees let go too
    Controversial Pegasus spyware maker to focus on NATO sales while battling various court cases Pegasus spyware slinger NSO Group announced on Sunday it will reorganize, replacing its CEO and letting go of around 100 workers.…  ( 5 min )
    Huawei dangles developer incentives to sell Harmony OS around the world
    Plus: Indonesia's four-hour takedown demand; Peak Facebook in Korea?; Alibaba frees font; and more. Asia In Brief  Huawei last week unveiled initiatives to encourage developers to work on its Harmony OS – the platform it created after US sanctions denied the Chinese giant access to Google's Android operating system.…  ( 8 min )
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    Jonathan Wiltshire: Team Roles and Tuckman’s Model, for Debian teams
    When I first moved from being a technical consultant to a manager of other consultants, I took a 5-day course Managing Technical Teams – a bootstrap for managing people within organisations, but with a particular focus on technical people. We do have some particular quirks, after all… Two elements of that course keep coming to mind when doing Debian work, and they both relate to how teams fit together and get stuff done. Tuckman’s four stages model In the mid-1960s Bruce W. Tuckman developed a four-stage descriptive model of the stages a project team goes through in its lifetime. They are: Forming: the team comes together and its members are typically motivated and excited, but they often also feel anxiety or uncertainty about how the team will operate and their place within it. Storming: …  ( 5 min )
    Antoine Beaupré: Alternatives MPD clients to GMPC
    GMPC (GNOME Music Player Client) is a audio player based on MPD (Music Player Daemon) that I've been using as my main audio player for years now. Unfortunately, it's marked as "unmaintained" in the official list of MPD clients, along with basically every client available in Debian. In fact, if you look closely, all but one of the 5 unmaintained clients are in Debian (ario, cantata, gmpc, and sonata), which is kind of sad. And none of the active ones are packaged. GMPC status and features GMPC, in particular, is basically dead. The upstream website domain has been lost and there has been no release in ages. It's built with GTK2 so it's bound to be destroyed in a fire at some point anyways. Still: it's really an awesome client. It has: cover support lyrics and tabs lookups (although those ty…  ( 2 min )
    Wouter Verhelst: Remote notification
    Sometimes, it's useful to get a notification that a command has finished doing something you were waiting for: make my-large-program && notify-send "compile finished" "success" || notify-send "compile finished" "failure" This will send a notification message with the title "compile finished", and a body of "success" or "failure" depending on whether the command completed successfully, and allows you to minimize (or otherwise hide) the terminal window while you do something else, which can be a very useful thing to do. It works great when you're running something on your own machine, but what if you're running it remotely? There might be something easy to do, but I whipped up a bit of Perl instead: #!/usr/bin/perl -w use strict; use warnings; use Glib::Object::Introspection; Glib::Object…  ( 1 min )
    Simon Josefsson: Static network config with Debian Cloud images
    I self-host some services on virtual machines (VMs), and I’m currently using Debian 11.x as the host machine relying on the libvirt infrastructure to manage QEMU/KVM machines. While everything has worked fine for years (including on Debian 10.x), there has always been one issue causing a one-minute delay every time I install a new VM: the default images run a DHCP client that never succeeds in my environment. I never found out a way to disable DHCP in the image, and none of the documented ways through cloud-init that I have tried worked. A couple of days ago, after reading the AlmaLinux wiki I found a solution that works with Debian. The following commands creates a Debian VM with static network configuration without the annoying one-minute DHCP delay. The three essential cloud-init ke…  ( 4 min )
    Russ Allbery: Review: And Shall Machines Surrender
    Review: And Shall Machines Surrender, by Benjanun Sriduangkaew Series: Machine Mandate #1 Publisher: Prime Books Copyright: 2019 ISBN: 1-60701-533-1 Format: Kindle Pages: 86 And Shall Machines Surrender starts in medias res, with a hinted-at backstory in the Armada of Amaryllis, and then never fills in the details. I felt like I was scrabbling on a wall of ice, trying to find some purchase as a reader. The relationships made this worse. Orfea is a sexual sadist who likes power games, and the story dives into her relationship with Krissana with a speed that left me uninterested and uninvested. I don't mind BDSM in story relationships, but it requires some foundation: trust, mental space, motivations, effects on the other character, somet…  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    VESA Creates ClearMR Spec To Grade Motion Blur On Displays
    A new motion blur specification has been released by VESA, to more accurately benchmark image quality in motion on all types of displays.  ( 60 min )
    Intel Ponte Vecchio Seemingly Offers 2.5x Higher Performance Than Nvidia's A100
    Intel details the company's Ponte Vecchio Xe-HPC GPU at Hot Chips 34.  ( 62 min )
    Leaked TSMC Slide Shows N3E Yields Progressing Ahead of Plan
    We don’t know if the improved pace of development will mean an earlier date for the mass production of N3E. However, if this is likely, TSMC will promptly inform the market/shareholders.  ( 59 min )
    AMD, Nvidia GPU Prices Continue Downward Turn
    The latest data from the German publication 3D Center reveals the newest trend in AMD and Nvidia GPU pricing.  ( 59 min )
    Samsung Germany RMA Suggests Drilling or Smashing The SSD With a Hammer
    During an RMA process, a Samsung representative reportedly asked a customer to destroy his dying Samsung 980 Pro SSD.  ( 60 min )
    Intel Details 3D Chip Packaging Tech for Meteor Lake, Arrow Lake and Lunar Lake
    Intel detailed its 3D Foveros chiplet packaging technology for its Meteor Lake, Arrow Lake and Lunar Lake processors at Hot Chips 34.  ( 65 min )
    Intel Unleashes Alder Lake PS CPUs: Up To 14 Cores at 45W
    Intel hopes to deliver up to 4.4x faster graphics and 6.6x AI inference to the edge and has lined up hybrid IoT chips up to 14C/20T and 45W power.  ( 59 min )
    Intel Arc A380 GPU Power Limit Thwarts Overclocking Endeavor
    Extreme overclocker SkatterBencher tries his best to overclock Intel's Arc A380 to 3.1 GHz, but Intel driver limitations and PL4 power limit issues prevent a successful overclock.  ( 59 min )
    UK Lawsuit Pursues Sony For £5 Billion For Allegedly Overcharging Gamers
    A UK legal action alleging Sony kept PS Store prices high is seeking up to £5 billion in compensation.  ( 59 min )
    Saints Row 2022 PC Performance and Settings Preview
    We've tested a collection of graphics cards on the Saints Row 2022 reboot to see what sort of performance you can expect. We also provide an in-depth look at the settings and which ones have the biggest impact on frame rates and image fidelity.  ( 71 min )
    Cooler Master GM32-FQ Gaming Monitor Review: Accurate Color, Low Input Lag
    Cooler Master’s GM32-FQ is a 32-inch IPS/QHD gaming monitor with 165 Hz, Adaptive-Sync HDR and extended color. It also sports near-perfect color accuracy and extremely low input lag.  ( 68 min )
    Raspberry Pi Project Enables I2C Interface Using HDMI Port
    Solaria123 is using the HDMI port on his Raspberry Pi 4 to enable I2C support when access is otherwise blocked.  ( 59 min )
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    Cities: Skylines is getting another expansion with Plazas and Promenades
    Plazas and Promenades is the next expansion for the city-builder Cities: Skylines, giving you the option to build up some special pedestrian zones.  ( 5 min )
    Mask of the Rose from Failbetter Games delayed until April 2023
    Failbetter Games put a new production update post up recently for Mask of the Rose that went over the user interface, but they also announced a delay.  ( 5 min )
    Humble Store has a big Summer Sale live, lots on offer for Steam Deck & Linux
    It's the beginning of a fresh week so maybe you want some new games? Well, Humble Store has a huge amount discounted in their new Summer Sale that lasts until September 6th.  ( 4 min )
    Star Labs reveal the StarBook Mk VI with Ryzen 7 or Intel 12th Gen
    Star Labs, hardware vendor with some really lovely looking laptops with first-class Linux support have announced the StarBook Mk VI with Ryzen 7 or Intel 12th Gen.  ( 4 min )
    Survival city-building game Synergy certainly looks different
    A city-builder not quite like the others it seems. Synergy from Leikir Studio and Goblinz Publishing has a pretty great pastel colour style to it.  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Dagens förseningsnyhet - Flashback 2 skjuts fram till 2023
    Det är många förseningar nu...  ( 6 min )
    Pikmin-liknande Tinykin släpps 30 augusti
    Och en demo väntar på att testas.  ( 6 min )
    Julis bäst säljande spel i USA? Gratistiteln Multiversus
    Sett till mängden stålar som dragits in.  ( 6 min )
    Se Gamescom Opening Night Live på FZ!
    Två timmars spelnyheter, start klockan 20 tisdag kväll.  ( 6 min )
    Sony stäms på 62 miljarder kronor i Storbritannien för konkurrensbrott
    Eftersom de tar 30 % i provision.  ( 6 min )
    Saints Row
    GTA:s spretiga kusin söker sina rötter.  ( 9 min )
    Sony är inte inblandade i Death Stranding på pc-Game Pass
    Som väntat.  ( 6 min )
    The Ascent: Cyber Heist
    Inget rån, men inte det perfekta brottet heller.  ( 8 min )
    Se första teasern för The Last of Us-serien
    Släpps på HBO nästa år.  ( 6 min )
    Hogwarts Legacy får ytterligare en ASMR-video med vackra in game-miljöer
    Och på Gamescom ska det visas upp ännu mer.  ( 6 min )
    Cult of the Lamb krängde en miljon exemplar under sin första vecka
    Och uppdateringar med fixar och nytt innehåll är på väg.  ( 6 min )
    Ta en svensk skogspromenad i Bramble: The Mountain Kings senaste video
    18 minuter av igelkottsridning, Den blomstertid nu kommer och näcken.  ( 6 min )
    Sagolikt vackra Black Myth: Wukong får massor av nytt videomaterial
    Bossar, resurssamlande och kanske en hårig, tjurig spindel.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Gigabyte siktar på 12 GB/s med färsk PCI Express 5.0-SSD
    Lagringsenheterna som drar nytta av PCI Express 5.0-protokollet är på ingång. När Gigabyte nu presenterar sitt första bidrag handlar det om hastigheter på minst 10 GB/s.  ( 5 min )
    Huawei Mate 50 presenteras i september – första uppgraderingen på två år
    Huawei återupplivar Mate-serien och kommer presentera tillskottet Mate 50 i september.  ( 6 min )
    Förbokning öppnar för Samsung Odyssey Ark – kostar 33 000 kronor
    Samsungs nya monsterskärm Odyssey Ark har fått svenskt pris på 33 000 kronor och går att förboka hos återförsäljare.  ( 6 min )
    Qualcomm uppges återvända till servermarknaden med egna processorer
    Förra årets uppköp av Nuvia rapporteras mynna ut i ARM-baserade serverprocessorer, där Amazon är en av intressenterna.  ( 5 min )
    Direktsänd frågestund med Samsungs produktexpert
    Samsung står till tjänst med direktsänd frågestund inför säljstarten av den senaste generationen mobila enheter.  ( 6 min )
    Ikväll 20:00 – Direktsänd frågestund med Samsungs produktexpert
    Samsung står till tjänst med direktsänd frågestund inför säljstarten av den senaste generationen mobila enheter. Passa på att ställa dina frågor i SweClockers forum.  ( 6 min )
    Livestreamad frågestund med Samsungs produktexpert på onsdag
    Samsung står till tjänst med direktsänd frågestund inför säljstarten av den senaste generationen Galaxy. Passa på att ställa dina frågor i SweClockers forum.  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    PlayStation planning Gravity Rush film - report
    PlayStation is planning to adapt the excellent Gravity Rush into a movie, it has been reported. Deadline states that the Japan Studio title is the latest to be added to a long, long line of projects in the works at PlayStation Productions. So far, director Anna Mastro (who helmed Disney+ series Secret Society of Second Born Royals) and script writer Emily Jerome (Panopticon) are attached. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The Game Awards returns this December
    The Game Awards 2022 will be held on 8th December, it has been announced. The video game industry's annual winter trailer fest, which also includes some awards, will broadcast live from the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles, and be livestreamed online. This year's show will include a new category for Best Adaptation, which will award "shows, movies, books, podcasts, comics and more" which "authentically adapt" video game source material. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Minecraft Steve regrows beard after more than a decade
    Minecraft's default player skin Steve has finally regrown its original beard, after 13 years. Developer Mojang has updated the character designs for both Steve and Alex for the first time in over a decade. The changes add extra 3D elements to both of their blocky models - and return Steve's OG face fuzz. Steve's beard was lost back in 2009, as part of a move to make Minecraft's default skin more gender-neutral. It wasn't until 2014 that the ponytailed Alex made an appearance. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Latest Return to Monkey Island clip shines light on streamlined UI
    Another Monday, another Return to Monkey Island clip for us all to pore over. The latest clip from creator Ron Gilbert shows the game's new streamlined UI, with prompts appearing on-screen as hero Guybrush Threepwood explores the Scumm Bar on Melee Island. When the cursor moves across the screen in this clip, messages such as "Time to talk to the pirate leaders" and "Smells good in there" pop up. The interactions shown do not appear intrusive, and seem to offer a clever way of keeping the story moving along. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Streamer completes Elden Ring one-handed level one run
    Twitch streamer Miss Mikkaa has beaten Elden Ring single-handedly. No really - she's beaten all Remembrances with just one hand and at level one. And that includes the formidable Malenia. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Tintin game to adapt Cigars of the Pharaoh
    A video game version of Tintin classic Cigars of the Pharaoh will launch for PC, plus Nintendo Switch, PlayStation and Xbox consoles in 2023. The project will adapt one of the best early Tintin comic books, from a time when the young reporter (and Snowy the dog) were not yet accompanied by sidekick Captain Haddock. The project - developed by Madrid-based adventure game maker Pendulo Studios, and published by French company Microids - was first mentioned by Microids back in April 2020, before all went quiet. We've been waiting to hear more ever since. Now, here's a teaser trailer: Read more  ( 15 min )
    Cities Skylines gets pedestrianisation in new Plazas and Promenades expansion
    Paradox Interactive has unveiled new Cities Skylines expansion Plazas and Promenades expansion, coming to PC, Xbox, and PlayStation "soon". Plazas and Promenades - the 11th major expansion for developer Colossal Order's acclaimed city builder - brings a new pedestrianisation focus to the game, giving budding urban planners the tools needed to add pedestrian-only streets, pedestrian zones, and zone-specific policies. The latter include the likes of Slow Driving (which implements a 20mph speed limit for all non-highway roads within a pedestrian zone), Sugar Ban (which increases citizen lifespan at the expense of happiness), and Music (increasing happiness but also increasing noise pollution). Read more  ( 15 min )
    Ubisoft shuts down Marvel Blade game gossip
    Ubisoft has denied reports it is making a game based on Marvel's infamous vampire hunter Blade. The reports were sparked by photos - originally posted to Instagram back in July - that showed actors in Ubisoft-branded mo-cap suits apparently working on a Marvel project. The images resurfaced yesterday thanks to YouTuber and regular Ubisoft leaker JorRaptor, who pointed out a clapperboard which listed director Bassam Tariq - who is also directing Marvel's 2023 Blade reboot. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Trans Twitch streamer Keffals in hiding after doxxing attack follows swatting incident
    Trans Twitch streamer Clara "Keffals" Sorrenti has been doxxed following a swatting incident earlier this month. Sorrenti posted a video after the event describing how she was "terrorised" by police when they arrived at her home with assault rifles. She's since moved to a hotel but has now been doxxed by a transphobic hate group known as Kiwi Farms. Read more  ( 16 min )
    New Wordle starter suggested by The New York Times
    WordleBot, The New York Times' own official "daily Wordle companion", has suggested a new starting word for us all to try. As noted by The Verge, WordleBot now lists 'Slate' as the optimal starting word. Previously, 'Crane' was the New York Times' favourite starting suggestion, however this has been given the boot in favour of the 'S' and 'T' inclusive 'Slate'. This makes sense, as 'S' and 'T' are two of the most commonly occurring letters throughout our dictionary. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Saints Row 2022 PS5 and Series X/S tech review: uneven performance, bugs and modes galore
    Saints Row is back after a seven year break, a proper 2022 series reboot from developer Volition that reinvents the series on several fronts - and I'm overwhelmed. Not because of the game itself - it's good chaotic fun - but because of Volition's approach to PS5 and Xbox Series X support. There are five different graphics modes - two at 1080p, two at 1440p and one at 4K - plus toggles for ray-traced ambient occlusion (RTAO) on the high quality 1080p and 1440p modes. That's seven permutations in all, perhaps a record for a major console release, yet Series S has no settings to change at all. On the surface, the level of customisability on PS5 and Series X is amazing stuff, offering tons of flexibility - but it also requires a ton of testing, both on our side and in the Volition QA departmen…  ( 20 min )
    Saints Row (2022) review - a snappy but slightly uneven reboot
    It takes guts to reboot something, doesn't it? Guts, and no doubt a lot of hand-wringing. It's a taciturn acknowledgement that something, at its core, still has value - something is worth sticking with - and yet it's also a painful public admission that something else isn't quite right. Be it a TV show, movie, or video game, I don't think that's ever an easy conclusion to reach… well, not with the eyes of an ardent fanbase looking on, anyways. Whatever you feel about the decision to reboot the flailing Saints Row franchise, it's hard not to respect developer Volition and publisher THQ for that gutsy decision. I'll admit to you now, ahead of the series' reboot, Saints Row and I were not on good terms. It's the purple, I think: the purple and the silliness. I know all that was deliberate - that the franchise sought to differentiate itself from the numerous other GTA clones around it by slapping on some purple paint and making every entry just that little bit more larger-than-life - but there was too much of both for my tastes. It became too big and too unwieldy and - like Violet Beauregarde's similarly purple silhouette - that overshadowed everything else it had going for it. No, not every game needs to be serious and no, not every story has to be emotive… but not every game needs giant dildos, either. So whilst I enjoyed Saints Row and its sequel, I didn't enjoy my stay with The Third, and side-stepped Saints Row IV altogether, which should give you some indication of my trepidation coming in, reboot or no reboot. I knew Volition can make engaging games with excellent characters and delightful gunplay, just as I knew Saints Row wasn't for me. Well. Until now, anyway. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Mega Drive Mini 2 gets European release date, as full game catalogue announced
    Sega has announced the European release date for its Mega Drive Mini 2. For those in Europe who are keen to get their hands on the mini retro console, you will be able to do so from the 27th October. If you are keeping track, this is the same day as the Genesis Mini 2 in North America. To accompany this release date announcement, Sega has also lifted the lid on all the games that will be available on the console. Read more  ( 15 min )
    New Black Myth: Wukong trailer prompts fans to resurface misogynistic comments from developer
    A new gameplay trailer has been released for Black Myth: Wukong. The game grew to prominence when it was revealed in 2020, showcasing its Soulslike gameplay and basis on Chinese novel Journey To The West. However, the new trailer has also resurfaced criticism of the game's developer for misogynistic views. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Fans believe new Pokémon is a pre-evolution of Scarlet and Violet's Legendaries
    Over the weekend, we got a look at a brand new Pokémon. This new addition is Cyclizar, and it was featured as part of a new trailer for the upcoming Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet, shown during the closing ceremony of this year's Pokémon World Championships. The trailer, which you can watch below, shows Cyclizar with motorbike-esque appendages that are very similar to fellow bipedal reptile-like legendary Koraidon. It also shows off a new move called "Shed Tail", which allows players to create a substitute and then "swap places with a party Pokémon in waiting". Read more  ( 16 min )
    Tee off with PGA Tour 2K23 and Tiger Woods this October
    We now have release dates for the various editions of upcoming golfing sim PGA Tour 2K23, which features Tiger Woods as its cover athlete. First up are the PGA Tour 2K23 Deluxe Edition and the Tiger Woods Edition. These will both be released on 11th October. The standard edition will then be released a few days later on the 14th October. You can see a new live-action trailer below. Read more  ( 15 min )
    UK National Grid reportedly plans cheaper energy if you avoid peak-time use
    Discounts on energy bills will reportedly be offered to UK households which avoid electricity usage during peak times. This could mean rebates for those who avoid using consumer goods such as computers and games consoles between the hours of 5pm and 8pm each evening, BBC News wrote. The scheme is reportedly being planned by the National Grid electricity system operator (ESO) for those with smart meters, with full details to be set out in the next two weeks after consultation with energy companies and UK regulator Ofgem. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Sony sued for £5bn for "ripping people off" on PlayStation Store
    Sony is being sued for £5bn, accused of "ripping people off" on its online store. The legal claim is led by ex-managing director of Which UK Alex Neill and was filed with the Competition Appeal Tribunal last week. It claims by charging a 30 percent commission on digital games and in-game purchases on the PlayStation Store, Sony is in breach of competition law. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The Last of Us' new Trophy list won't make you complete the game on harder difficulties
    Ahead of its release this September, the Trophy list for The Last of Us Part 1's PlayStation 5 remake has leaked. Please be aware, the below article contains story spoilers for The Last of Us. Read at your own discretion. A series of shots showing off the remake's Trophy list has been shared by Twitter account Naughty Dog Central. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Fortnite cosmetics are coming to Destiny 2
    Destiny 2 will host a series of Fortnite cosmetics, a recent datamine of the game has revealed. Themed armour sets for each of Destiny's three classes have been leaked, each showcasing a look based on a classic Fortnite skin (thanks, Ginsor). Bungie is yet to confirm the collaboration, which seems likely to be made official tomorrow night during its big Destiny 2 livestream. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Original GTA developer hit with copyright strikes against prototype videos
    A developer from the original Grand Theft Auto game has reportedly had prototype videos hit with a copyright strike from Rockstar Games. Mike Dailly, one of the founders of DMA Design (now Rockstar North), has tweeted he's removed any GTA videos due to the strikes. "I see Rockstar are going full fuckers mode again, issuing copyright strikes to any GTA video they can find - including both my prototype videos. So now they're trying to block all release of anyone's work on a game - and any old development footage," he tweeted yesterday. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Rollerdrome is wheely good and so much more
    It's another Weekly, the podcast show where we recap Eurogamer for you. We whisk through what's been going on as well as dive into more detail on some of the bigger reviews and talking points of last week. Weekly normally goes out to premium supporters every Friday and everyone else on Monday, but this episode was held up and I'm sorry about that. It's going live for everyone today. Joining me today on Weekly are news reporter Victoria Kennedy, who you'll recognise from the Newscast, and the Strandmon of features, Christian Donlan. Read more  ( 15 min )
    I've discovered Wrecking Crew, the game where Mario can't jump, and it's brilliant
    Every now and then I think, oh, I should track down Devil World, the classic Miyamoto maze game that never got a proper release in the West. This week I loaded up the Switch NES collection to see if it had somehow crept onto that, but of course it hadn't. What I found instead was Wrecking Crew, a game I knew almost nothing about. Actually, let's do this. What I knew was: former arcade game? Mario's in it? That's it. And both those things I only thought I knew. So I gave Wrecking Crew a toot, and I am here to tell you that you should also give Wrecking Crew a toot, if you haven't already. It's an absolute charmer. And it's weird and clever and has a bunch of very interesting ideas in it. And it doesn't entirely work - and I mean that, I think, as a good thing. Read more  ( 16 min )
    First footage of HBO's The Last of Us TV adaptation released
    We now have our first look at HBO's upcoming adaptation of The Last of Us. Shared as part of a collection of teasers for the service's new season, this clip was brief but enticing. It comes with the obligatory dramatic music as it shows us snippets of Pedro Pascal's Joel running through the streets with someone who I won't name to avoid spoilers, Bella Ramsay as Ellie and Nick Offerman as Bill. While we don't see any of the series' infected enemies, we do get a brief snap of some fungal like spores on a wall, hinting at the devastation the world is in. The entire HBO clip, which can be seen below, also gives us small teasers for shows such as The Idol, Doom Patrol and Pennyworth. However, if you want to jump straight to The Last of Us, that begins at around the 1:43 mark. Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    GNOME 43's Mutter Lands Max BPC Property Support To Deal With Monitor Issues
    Earlier this summer was the patch series for GNOME's Mutter to make use of the Linux DRM/KMS "max BPC" property for the drivers exposing the maximum bits per color supported. That code has now been merged in time for next month's GNOME 43 release and in turn will help deal with some scenarios where users may encounter screen flickering, brief blackouts, and other problems related to available monitor bandwidth...  ( 5 min )
    Asahi Linux May Have OpenGL 2.1 For Apple M1/M2 By Year's End
    Alyssa Rosenzweig who is known for her work on the Panfrost open-source, reverse-engineered Arm Mali driver and has been spending nearly two years now involved with the Asahi Linux crew working on reverse-engineered Apple M1/M2 graphics support has shared a new status update...  ( 6 min )
    Zink OpenGL-On-Vulkan Benchmarks Are Very Competitive To Radeon OpenGL Driver
    With this weekend having seen more Zink refactoring code land and Zink being faster than RadeonSI at least for some operations, it was time to fire up some fresh benchmarks of this generic OpenGL-on-Vulkan implementation. From the newest Mesa code this weekend after the latest Zink patches were merged, here is a look at how the Zink performance is compared to the RadeonSI Gallium3D driver's native OpenGL support. All of the testing was done using an AMD Radeon RX 6800 XT graphics card.  ( 4 min )
    Ubuntu Now Supports The Allwinner D1 Powered Nezha RISC-V Board
    Last week Canonical announced official Ubuntu RISC-V images for the StarFive VisionFive board while this week they are expanding their supported RISC-V line-up to also include the Nezha single board computer powered by the Allwinner D1 SoC...  ( 5 min )
    GTK4's Broadway HTML5 Backend Coming Back To Ubuntu, Debian
    For the past decade going back to the early GTK3 days there has been the "Broadway" back-end that allows for GTK interfaces to be rendered within HTML5 web browsers. Aside from demos and other toys, there hasn't been too much widespread use reported with this GTK HTML5 back-end and some distributions like Ubuntu and Debian haven't been shipping the Broadway support with the newer GTK4. However, that is changing now for Debian and with this autumn's release of Ubuntu 22.10...  ( 5 min )
    Experimental Patches Allow Much Faster AArch64 & RISC-V Kexec Kernel Reboots
    For those making use of Kexec reboots for booting to a new kernel without fully bringing down the system to reduce the server downtime from POST'ing and other hardware initialization tasks, Kexec reboots may soon be much faster on 64-bit Arm and RISC-V systems...  ( 5 min )
    Kdenlive 22.08 Video Editor Brings UI Improvements, Experimental Parallel Processing
    Following last week's release of KDE Gear 22.08, Kdenlive 22.08 is out as the newest version of this open-source, KDE/Qt-aligned non-linear video editing software...  ( 4 min )
    Linux 6.0-rc2 Released
    Linus Torvalds has just released Linux 6.0-rc2 as the newest weekly test candidate for this next major kernel series...  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Sorry, but Ubisoft isn't making a Blade game, says the developer itself
    Despite what you might have recently heard, Ubisoft itself has squashed any rumours that it's working on a Blade game. The initial rumour that Ubisoft was developing a game based on the Marvel character Blade was due to Instagram posts from July showing motion-capture actors in Ubisoft-branded suits. Not only that, but one of the images shows one of the actors holding a clapperboard that says the production name is Marvel. The flame of this rumour was then reignited when YouTuber and Ubisoft leaker JorRaptor pointed out how the clapperboard also lists Bassam Tariq as the director, who is directing Marvel's 2023 Blade reboot. However, in a move that is quite unusual for a developer to do, Ubisoft actually put out an announcement to say that, no, the studio isn't working on a Blade game. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Destiny 2 datamine shows off Fortnite crossover skins, zero mentions of best-fruit Peely
    Destiny 2 fans that feel like the game is missing a certain chug-jug flair might be happy to learn that some Fortnite crossover skins have leaked online. While both Destiny and Fornite are both shooters, in general their tone is quite different, with one obviously meant to be taken a bit more seriously than the other. So when you hear 'Fortnite x Destiny 2 skins,' you might rightly think 'oh no, are they putting a giant banana man in Destiny,' but as shown by dataminer Ginsor, the skins actually fit the bill pretty well. This weekend, Ginsor posted a tweet showing a screenshot of three skins that will be coming to Destiny 2 at some point in the future, showing what looks to be a Titan, Warlock, and Hunter donning some new cosmetics, inspired by the Black Knight, Drift, and Omega skins in Fortnite. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Yakuza creator wants his next game to "be like a Tarantino film"
    In a recent interview, Yakuza creator Toshihiro Nagoshi said that his next game at his new studio will be "like a Quentin Tarantino film." Nagoshi recently spoke to German publication 4Players (translations by VGC), where he provided some light details about his next game, a new IP from Nagoshi Studio at NetEase. While he wasn't able to provide any concrete details, he did talk about how he doesn't want to move too far away from his roots. "Of course, I can’t reveal too much about our game yet, but I can give a rough idea: It will definitely contain violence as a game element, but I don’t want to go too much in the direction of thriller or even horror," Nagoshi said. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Saints Row Review: Stripped-back shooter-focused sandbox feels aimless outside of super set-pieces
    The corporate military is muscling in on my turf. I’ve got a nice little racket going where I hurl myself in front of traffic, get fired 50 feet up in the air and rake it in from multiple bogus insurance claims, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let them steal my innovative idea. So as I gun it over to where they’re set up in my pearlescent lambo, I need to select the perfect piece of equipment to show them who’s boss. The uzi will do nicely. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Rockstar is taking down prototype Grand Theft Auto videos released by one of the game's creators
    Mike Dailly, one of the founding members of the studio that created Grand Theft Auto, seems to have had some prototype videos of the original game taken down by Rockstar. If you aren't familiar with Dailly, he was the first employee at DMA Design, which later became Rockstar North, and went on to make the graphics engine for GTA. Dailly also runs a YouTube channel where he uploads a variety of techy things, including some behind the scenes, early tests of games he worked on, including prototypes of the first GTA, but he's now claimed that Rockstar has filed a takedown on them. Two of the videos that were taken down, as reported by PC Gamer, showed off some renders of prototype graphics developed by Dailly in the early 90s. The first was a rotating, isometric prototype, and the other a top-down one, both of which showed buildings and streets. Another video showed an old beta copy of GTA. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Death Stranding's launch on PC Game Pass did not involve Sony
    Just last week, rumours were confirmed to be true when it was officially revealed that Death Stranding will be soon arriving on PC Game Pass. So soon, in fact, that subscribers will be able to install and play the game tomorrow, August 23. Sony has since gone on to share a statement with PushSquare, stating that "Matters relating to the PC release of Death Stranding are managed by Kojima Productions and 505 Games," and that “[Sony Interactive Entertainment] has no involvement in this promotion.” In case you didn't already know, Sony owns and funded Death Stranding. This certainly is far from the first and last time that a Sony title has made its way onto Game Pass, but this is one of the rare occasions in which many of us are left asking exactly how Kojima Productions and 505 brought Death Stranding to the rival subscription service. Read more  ( 16 min )
    New footage from HBO's The Last of Us TV show is out now and it's looking great
    The first official peek at the Last of Us TV adaptation is out in the wild courtesy of a new HBO montage trailer going through their lineup of ongoing or soon-to-drop series. Right at the end of the video, we see a few scenes of major characters as well as confirmation that it’ll be coming out next year. Exciting stuff! While great stuff like Succession and Game of Thrones got ample time in the spotlight, fans of the hugely popular Naughty Dog action adventure game will be glued to a few seconds of precious new footage showing off the upcoming re-imagining of the Last of Us story. In the short clip of HBO’s Last of Us, we see Joel and Ellie played by Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey respectively travelling across a ravaged USA, seemingly following a similar journey as they did in the original game - crossing through the abandoned world together, and hashing out their issues as they go. Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    How to List USB Devices Connected to Your Linux System
    Listing the USB devices connected to your system can help in troubleshooting the USB issues. Learn various GUI and command line methods of getting USB details in Linux.  ( 25 min )
  • Open

    Comic for 2022.08.22 - Fashion Police
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )
  • Open

    Physics Safety Tip
    No content preview  ( 1 min )

  • Open

    Nyhetsquiz vecka 33 2022: Snabbtester, krönika och blandade nyheter
    Företagen håller andan inför höstens lanseringsfest, men redaktionen drygar ut det blandade nyhetsflödet med snabbtester och hyllningar. Får du full pott den här veckan?  ( 5 min )
    Kompletts somriga datortävling är avgjord
    Tre Khameleon 12i-datorer hittar nu nytt hem hos SweClockers-medlemmar som lovar intressanta recensioner av produkterna.  ( 6 min )
    Söndagsmatiné: Skrivmaskinen som korrigerar misstag
    Knivskarp text och möjlighet att sudda misstag låter kanske som något som tarvar dator med ordbehandlare, men i veckans videotips visas skrivmaskiner som klarar detsamma.  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Comic for 2022.08.21 - Top or Bottom
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )
  • Open

    Rare Intel Cannon Lake CPU Emerges With Three Chiplets
    A new Cannon Lake "Special Samples" prototype CPU has emerged, showcasing a third die featuring integrated voltage regulation functionality.  ( 62 min )
    AMD Threadripper Pro 5995WX and 5975WX Review: Sheer Threaded Dominance
    AMD's Threadripper Pro 5995WX and 5975WX barrel into the workstation market with 64 cores, 128 threads, eight memory channels, and class-leading performance.  ( 67 min )
    How to Secure Erase an SSD or HDD Before Selling It or Your PC
    If you're selling your PC or storage drive, you need to wipe it so well that the next person can't recover your data.  ( 63 min )
  • Open

    MultiVersus tops Elden Ring to become July's best-selling game
    MultiVersus has knocked Elden Ring off the top spot of the month's best-selling games. NPD Group reports (thanks, NME) that despite being free-to-play - albeit with in-game purchases - MultiVersus is the highest-grossing game of July 2022, due in part to its Founder Packs promotion. It may not sound like a particularly impressive feat but to put it into perspective, since its release in February, Elden Ring has been the best-selling game every month but one. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Find out how F1 Manager's "cutting-edge" motion capture "brings the game to life"
    Frontier has released another instalment of its F1 Manager behind-the-scenes series, this time focussing on how its "cutting-edge motion capture technology has been used to recreate those dramatic moments during a race weekend". The video also showcases how the team worked alongside the BWT Alpine F1 Team to capture a real F1 pit stop, which you will see "brought to life in the game". It's a fascinating glimpse into how games are made, and the lengths developers go to to try and create an authentic sim experience. Check it out below: Read more  ( 15 min )
    Ubisoft+ may be launching on Xbox soon
    It looks like Ubisoft+ - Ubisoft's own game subscription service - may finally be on the way to Xbox. Up until now, Ubisoft+ has only been available to players on PC, but a service that scrapes Xbox's backend and spotted by our friends at VGC has reportedly found an Ubisoft+ logo in the system, hinting that Ubisoft+ may be coming soon. A prior announcement confirmed that Ubisoft+ - unlike EA Play - would not be part of Xbox Game Pass, and this is unlikely to have changed, particularly as a cut-down version of the Ubisoft sub, Ubisoft+ Classics, is available within the upper tiers of Sony's rival PS Plus. We'll have to wait until we get a formal announcement to confirm that either way, though. Read more  ( 15 min )
    This new Attacker puts the Swarm in Rainbow Six Siege's upcoming Operation Brutal Swarm
    Ubisoft has pulled back the curtain to give a sneaky peek at what's to come in Rainbow Six Siege's next update, Operation Brutal Swarm. Though details are light - more will be revealed in an upcoming livestream set for 21st August - we do learn more about new a 1 Health and 3 Speed Attacker Grim, a Singaporean with one goal: "to get the job done". "Grim's experience in the EOD taught him how easily things can blow up when a target's position and proximity is unknown," Ubisoft teases in a blog update. "That's where the Kawan Hive Launcher comes in, with no reload and a low fire rate the launcher allows for versatile gameplay, using Intel-Gathering and Area Denial to counter roamers, make entry, and protect objectives. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Oceanic survival game Raft now has an epic VR mod that will certainly float your boat
    Getting lost a sea just got a whole lot scarier thanks to a new flatscreen to VR mod for oceanic survival game Raft. Made by talented modder DrBibop, who is previously known for his Risk of Rain 2 VR mod, Raft VR brings the game's open waters to life in a spectacular way. Along with 6DoF movement and comfort options for things like seated or standing play, the mod also brings minor motion controls to the game as well. This means you won't be able to interact with most objects physically (using items is confined to a button press), but you will be able to use your actual arms to throw your salvage hook out into the ocean and hopefully towards some useful scrap. If you want to watch me indulge in some expert tossing, you can do so in this week's episode of VR Corner, which you can find just below these words. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Sega is now turning Space Channel 5 and Comix Zone into movies
    Sega is giving two more of its classic titles the movie treatment: Space Channel 5 and Comix Zone. No doubt inspired by the runaway success of the Sonic movies, Sega looks set to adapt the two games alongside Picturestart, which is also working on the upcoming Borderlands movie (which is seemingly now in post-production). Dance game Space Channel 5 will be retitled Channel 5 and, according to Hollywood Reporter, "tell the story of a hapless fast-food worker who is recruited by a freedom reporter from the future to save the world from aliens using the one thing that unites all people on the planet: our love of silly viral dances". Read more  ( 16 min )
    New job ad hints that Netflix is "rapidly expanding new gaming offerings"
    Netflix is looking to "rapidly expand" the "new gaming offerings" available on its cloud gaming service. That's according to a new job advertisement put out by the company that seeks a new senior software engineer with "experience with game development". As well as finding someone with all the necessary coding skills, Netflix hopes the new recruit will also have some experience in "Unity or Unreal game engines" and says it is "rapidly expanding new gaming offerings" on its global streaming service. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Final Fantasy 14 hopes this poster will persuade you to "voluntarily return" any "accidental" lottery deposits
    Final Fantasy 14 is hoping that a cute poster will persuade players to "voluntarily return" any mistaken housing lottery deposits. In a broader update about the 6.2 patch, the Final Fantasy 14 development team finally confirmed plans "to address a recent issue with the housing lottery system". "An NPC by which players may voluntarily return the deposit they were accidentally refunded has been added," the update states, above an image of three cute apology posters starring Namazu and Lalafell. Read more  ( 16 min )
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    The Pokémon World Championships revealed another motorbike lizard, and the future of the TCG
    The Pokémon World Championships showed off a tiny bit more of Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet, revealing a new Pokémon, new items, and more, as well as showing off the future of the trading card game. As part of the Competitive Play Trailer, a new Pokémon was revealed, Cyclizar, another lizard x motorbike pocket monster that almost definitely has something to do with this generation's legendaries Koraidon and Miraidon, who's Dragon/ Normal type. It looks like it has a signature move called Shed Tail, which lets Cyclizar withdraw and send out another Pokémon, but with a substitute in its place. There's a couple of new items too, the first of which is Mirror Herb, a most-likely single-use item that copies an opponent's stat increases when consumed. Also revealed was the item Loaded Dice, which can increase the chances of a multi-hitting move hitting more times than it normally would. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Recent job listing suggests Netflix is diving into cloud gaming
    It looks like Netflix is looking to get into the world of cloud gaming, as a recent job listing is looking for someone to support its cloud gaming service. Netflix has more or less tackled the world of film and television, but with acquisitions like Night School Studio and Boss Fight Entertainment, and a host of games available through the service now, it's clear that the entertainment service is looking to broaden its horizons. And those horizons appear to include cloud gaming, as noted in a recent job listing that references such (thanks, NME). "We are looking for a rendering engineer to support our cloud gaming service," reads the job listing. "In this role, you will help optimise the rendering of games so we can render multiple games on our cloud gaming appliances. You will also assist with the development of SDKs to enable game developers to succeed in writing high-quality games for the Netflix cloud games ecosystem." Read more  ( 15 min )
    Just Cause's developer worked on an Iron Man game for two years before it got canned
    It turns out that Just Cause developer Avalanche Studios previously worked on an Iron Man game for two years before it was ultimately cancelled. There are probably a million and one cancelled games we'll never hear about due to non-disclosure agreements and the like, but recently Avalanche Studios co-founder Christofer Sundberg, speaking to MinnMax, revealed that the studio was working on an Iron Man game that was unfortunately cancelled. According to Sundberg, Disney and Marvel came to the studio to inquire about an Iron Man game, which later began development that same year. But, according to Sundberg, Disney wanted to shorten the development time by a whole year, which given this industry's history with delays, isn't exactly the norm. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Sega is adapting two of its cult-classic titles into films
    Sega isn't stopping at Sonic when it comes to making movies, as adaptations of two of its more niche titles are in the works. As reported by The Hollywood Reporter, Sega and media company Picturestart are teaming up to produce adaptations of music video game Space Channel 5 and beat 'em up Comix Zone. According to the report, the adaptation of Space Channel 5, now seemingly just called Channel 5, will be a comedy/ dance take on the game, which all apparently "tell the story of a hapless fast-food worker who is recruited by a freedom reporter from the future to save the world from aliens using the one thing that unites all people on the planet: our love of silly viral dances." Read more  ( 15 min )
    One bit of farmland in Redfall is apparently bigger than all of Prey's whole map
    Redfall is set to be Arkane's biggest game yet, with one particular area bigger than the entirety of the setting for one of the studio's older games, Prey. QuakeCon has come and gone, but not without diving into some details on the upcoming vampire-ridden first-person shooter Redfall. As part of the convention's digital event, developers from Arkane Austin including studio director Harvey Smith spoke on what the game is, and what players can expect. During the conversation between the developers, the size of the map was brought up. "Speaking to the size, I think the Talos in Prey was five football fields, and the size of Redfall is kind of 'hold my beer'" art director Karen Segars said in the video. Read more  ( 16 min )
    A recent MultiVersus patch reportedly stops the game from booting up if mods are installed
    It looks like the MultiVersus modding scene might have to pack it in, as players using mods are reportedly unable to launch the game after a recent patch. As reported by Eurogamer, PC players who are using mods can no longer boot up the game while mods are turned on. Warner Bros. has recently filed a takedown notice on YouTube videos showing off MultiVersus character mods, and now in the most recent patch original any kind of mod is unusable. Mods for MultiVersus have mostly been a bit skins so far, which will only be viewable to the player that has them installed, as obviously anything that affects gameplay would be unfair to other players. But this recent change in the patch prevents players from using these mods, at least until some kind of work around is figured out, if one is even possible. Read more  ( 15 min )
    High on Life sees a two month delay, apologises with uncomfortable dating ad
    High on Life, the comedy sci-fi FPS from Squanch Games, has been delayed by two months, but a fun bit of animation was released as compensation. While High on Life was originally expected to launch October 25, Squanch Games has announced that the game has been delayed to December 13, just under two months later. "As we work to polish the best possible gaming experience for High on Life, the game’s release date will be moved to December 13, 2022," wrote Squanch games in the announcement post for the delay on Twitter. As an incredibly on-brand way of saying sorry, a slightly horrible piece of animation showing a man with the tightest underwear you'll ever see in your life showing off his very muscular and veiny son who's looking for a wife. He wears diapers, and he's ready to marry! What this has to do with High on Life, we wish we could tell you, but hey, it's 39 seconds of free animation, who are we to complain. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Kena: Bridge of Spirits is coming to Steam alongside a juicy anniversary update
    Kena: Bridge of Spirits is coming to Steam, with a big Anniversary update coming to all platforms. As revealed over at IGN, the PS2-esque, action-adventure game is officially coming to Steam just over a year after its initial release on September 27. Along with it comes a pretty big Anniversary Update, which will come to PS4, PS5, and the Epic Games Store where it was previously a PC exclusive. Players that want to run through the game another time but with all of the abilities unlocked will now be able to do so thanks to the New Game+ mode, which will also include previously unlocked upgrades, outfits, Rot, and more. The new mode also features redesigned and more challenging combat scenarios, including new enemies. Read more  ( 15 min )
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    Trailer för Helldivers 2 läcker i förtid
    Sony skickade dock ett gäng Marios som snabbt kunde stoppa läckan.  ( 6 min )
    Sony jobbar på en filmadaption baserat på zombiespelet Days Gone
    Sam Heughan kan få rollen som Deacon St. John.  ( 6 min )
    Kena: Bridge of Spirits släpps på Steam nästa månad
    …tillsammans med en stor uppdatering som släpps samma dag.  ( 6 min )
    Kena: Bridges of Spirits släpps på Steam nästa månad
    …tillsammans med en stor uppdatering som släpps samma dag.  ( 6 min )
    Sök drömjobbet - bli redaktör på FZ!
    Då Jocke nu söker sig vidare in i den akademiska världen behöver vi förstärkning på redaktionen. Sök Sveriges roligaste jobb!  ( 7 min )
    Drömjobb ledigt på FZ!
    Då Jocke nu söker sig vidare in i den akademiska världen behöver vi förstärkning på redaktionen. Sök Sveriges roligaste jobb!  ( 6 min )
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    R600 Gallium3D Driver Receives NIR Backend Fixes For Radeon HD 2000/3000/4000 Series
    In addition to the R300g driver seeing new shader optimizations, also being merged this week to Mesa 22.3 were some fixes for the recently-introduced new NIR back-end for the Rade R600 Gallium3D driver for the Radeon HD 2000/3000/4000 series...  ( 5 min )
    Open-Source NVIDIA Vulkan Driver "NVK" Sees Uptick In Activity This Week
    The open-source NVIDIA Vulkan driver "NVK" being developed for Mesa has seen a busy week of new development activity on this work-in-progress solution...  ( 5 min )
    R300 Open-Source Gallium3D Driver Sees New Optimization For Two Decade Old ATI GPUs
    Thanks to being open-source, the Mesa R300 Gallium3D driver that is used for supporting OpenGL on the ATI Radeon 9500/9600/9700/9800 series up through the Radeon X1000 "R500" series has seen a new set of performance optimization work twenty years after the R300 GPUs first shipped...  ( 5 min )
    Cloud Hypervisor 26.0 Released With SMBIOS Improvements, Unified Binary For MSHV/KVM
    Cloud Hypervisor 26.0 released this week as the newest version of this Rust-based hypervisor focused on cloud workloads and secure computing. The open-source Cloud Hypervisor started out as an Intel software project and continues to be led by them while now under Linux Foundation stewardship and continuing to see contributions from the likes of Arm and Microsoft...  ( 4 min )
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    Musk tries to sell Tesla's Optimus robot butler to China
    Plus: How US Homeland Security uses AI – and text-to-image systems deployed in social media In brief  Elon Musk wants Tesla's robot butler to be able to cook, mow laws, and care for the elderly, he wrote in an essay published in a magazine backed by the official Cyberspace Administration of China.…  ( 5 min )
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    Junichi Uekawa: Somehow my email in emacs/wl shows right justified.
    Somehow my email in emacs/wl shows right justified. Seems like some emails are detected as RTL language for some reason. Now how do I configure this...
    Russ Allbery: Review: A Prayer for the Crown-Shy
    Review: A Prayer for the Crown-Shy, by Becky Chambers Series: Monk & Robot #2 Publisher: Tordotcom Copyright: 2022 ISBN: 1-250-23624-X Format: Kindle Pages: 151 A Prayer for the Crown Shy is the second novella in the Monk & Robot series and a direct sequel to A Psalm for the Wild-Built. Don't start here. I would call this the continuing adventures of Sibling Dex and Mosscap the robot, except adventures is entirely the wrong term for stories with so little risk or danger. The continuing tour? The continuing philosophical musings? Whatever one calls it, it's a slow exploration of Dex's world, this time with Mosscap alongside. Humans are about to have their first contact with a robot since the Awakening. If you're expecting that to in…  ( 4 min )
    Iustin Pop: Note to self: Don't forget Qemu's discard option
    This is just a short note to myself, and to anyone who might run VMs via home-grown scripts (or systemd units). I expect modern VM managers to do this automatically, but for myself, I have just a few hacked together scripts. By default, QEMU (at least as of version 7.0) does not honour/pass discard requests from block devices to the underlying storage. This is a sane default (like lvm’s default setting), but with long-lived VMs it can lead to lots of wasted disk space. I keep my VMs on SSDs, which is limited space for me, so savings here are important. Older Debian versions did not trim automatically, but nowadays they do (which is why this is worth enabling for all VMs), so all you need is to pass: unmap=discard to activate the pass-through. optionally, detect-zeroes=unmap, but I don’t know how useful this is, as in, how often zeroes are written. And the next trim should save lots of disk space. It doesn’t matter much if you use raw or qcow2, both will know to unmap the unused disk, leading to less disk space used. This part seems to me safe security-wise, as long as you trust the host. If you have pass-through to the actual hardware, it will also do proper discard at the SSD level (with the potential security issues leading from that). I’m happy with the freed up disk space 🙂 Note: If you have (like I do) Windows VMs as well, using paravirt block devices, make sure the drive is recent enough. One interesting behaviour from Windows: it looks like the default cluster size is quite high (64K), which with many small files will lead to significant overhead. But, either I misunderstand, or Windows actually knows how to unmap the unused part of a cluster (although it takes a while). So in the end, the backing file for the VM (19G) is smaller than the “disk used” as reported in Windows (23-24G), but higher than “size on disk” for all the files (17.2G). Seems legit, and it still boots 😛 Most Linux file systems have much smaller block sizes (usually 4K), so this is not a problem for it.  ( 2 min )
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    Ooblets' cute creature-farming will hit 1.0 next month
    I've been following Ooblets since 2016, when it was called Moblets and consisted of some sparse but finely animated GIFs on Twitter. For that reason, and without having played it, it's great to hear that Ooblets is going to hit 1.0 and exit early access on September 1st. Aw, the Oobs are all grown up. Read more  ( 16 min )

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    Slime Rancher 2 will poop onto early access next month
    Slime Rancher 2 has a new setting and new slimes, but otherwise looks to offer the same satisfying collecting and tending as the original. If you've been longing to spend all your time tidying up, you'll be able to do so when it enters early access next month, on September 22nd. Read more  ( 16 min )
    There's a Days Gone movie adaptation in development
    Days Gone, Sony's zombie survival-on-a-motorbike game, is getting a movie adaptation. Deadline report that Sony PlayStation Productions is developing the project with Sheldon Turner attached as writer and Outlander's Sam Heughan attached to star. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Black Myth: Wukong's latest trailer shows no combat but is still gorgeous
    All of Black Myth: Wukong's trailers so far have looked stunning, but each one has focused on horrible monsters and combat with horrible monsters. Today's new trailer takes a different tact. It's a six minute-long cutscene in which some sisters discuss their mothers impending marriage, but it's no less beautiful to look at. Plus, if you stick to the very end, you'll still get to see a new horrible monster. Read more  ( 16 min )
    What are we all playing this weekend?
    The Edinburgh Festival is still in full swing so honestly, I've either been at home or out the city. I usually see a load of shows but most my favourite performers aren't up this year and I've not heard much about the sort of weird performance art I relish. Plus the crowds are the absolute worst, especially under covid. Residents should receive legal dispensation to throw one (1) oblivious cluster of path-blocking lollygaggers into a wall each week. Oh, video games? Yeah, what are you playing this weekend? Here's what we're clicking! Read more  ( 17 min )
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    The weekend’s best deals: Xbox Series S bundles, M2 MacBook Air, and more
    Dealmaster also has Anker charging cables, Doom games, and Surface PCs.  ( 10 min )
    Should we be trying to create a circular urine economy?
    Urine has lots of nitrogen and phosphorus—a problem as waste, great as fertilizer.  ( 7 min )
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    Yes, Intel's Feeble Arc A380 GPU Can Run Crysis
    YouTuber PCGH Benchmarks & Analysis has tested the Arc A380 graphics card on Crysis at 1080p (1920x1080) resolution.  ( 58 min )
    Intel's Meteor Lake CPUs May Arrive With Ray Tracing Hardware
    The latest Intel Graphics Compiler patches unearthed references to accelerated ray tracing abilities in Meteor Lake’s iGPU.  ( 60 min )
    Best CPU for Gaming in 2022
    Here are the best CPUs for gaming for the money, based on our benchmarks. These processors offer the best performance in their price ranges and most are suitable for overclocking.  ( 82 min )
    Raspberry Pi Cat Doorbell Listens for Meows
    Tennis Smith has created a Raspberry Pi-powered doorbell that listens for his to meow before sending a notification text.  ( 62 min )
    How To Hide Passwords in Your Code With Raspberry Pi Pico W
    Sharing code is how we learn, but we don’t want to share too much. In this how-to, we learn where to safely store our account credentials, and how to work with them.  ( 61 min )
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    Black Myth: Wukong gets a new trailer that shows off some lovely 4K gameplay
    Want a look at some 4K gameplay of Black Myth: Wukong with ray tracing and Nvidia DLSS? Of course you do, and it can be watched below. The latest trailer shows the main character exploring an immersive and mysterious forest, looking over collectibles and hidden elements, and the video shows off some new combat and enemies all with lovely ray tracing and DLSS. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Days Gone movie adaptation in the works
    A film adaptation of Bend Studio's Days Gone is said to be in the works. According to Deadline, the film will star Outlander‘s Sam Heughan (Jamie Fraser) and Oscar nominated screenwriter Sheldon Turner will adapt the script. Jennifer Klein and Turner will produce through their production company, Vendetta Productions. Asad Qizilbash and Carter Swan are producing for Sony PlayStation Productions. Read more  ( 15 min )
    A Plague Tale: Requiem gameplay overview takes a look at Amicia and Hugo's talents
    To celebrate going gold, Asobo Studio has released a gameplay overview trailer for A Plague Tale: Requiem. The video shows how to deal with rats and soldiers, introduces a few of the people you will meet along your journey south, a bit of crafting, and some of Hugo's powers. The sequel to the critically acclaimed A Plague Tale: Innocence, the game follows Amicia and her brother Hugo on a new quest as they try to survive an uncaring world as a terrifying curse hunts them in 14th century France. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Sonic Frontiers seemingly releasing on November 15, according to retail leak
    A retail shop in Taiwan seems to have confirmed a November 15 release date for Sonic Frontiers. Furthermore, the listing states the game will receive a batch of DLC after release (via reddit). If the date sounds familiar to you, it's because it popped up in the PlayStation database at one point before being removed (thanks, Nintendo Everything). Read more  ( 15 min )
    Cult of the Lamb recruited over one million followers within one miraculous week
    Massive Monster and Devolver Digital have announced that over one million have joined the Cult of the Lamb. The unholy congregation swelled to this robust number within one week. Despite such devotion, the flock has seen its fair share of struggles with all manner of bugs and other infernal complications - all of which must be abolished. Read more  ( 16 min )
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    PUBG's 19.1 update has arrived on PC and console - here's what's new
    PUBG's 19.1 update is finally here, ushering in a shedload of new features, including the Assassin's Creed limited-time event. It includes a new MP9 weapon - the first fully-automatic SMG that uses 9mm - a new vehicle that will see you unstealthily "zipping down roads with sirens ablaze", and the Blue Chip Detector tactical gear which uses primary weapon slots but can be used to scan for enemies within a 100m radius; you'll see the nearest 12 enemies on the map. "It’s time to explore the next chapter of PUBG: Battlegrounds, as Update 19.1 is officially live for PC and console players worldwide!" Krafton declares. "Take down enemies with the new MP9, zip down roads with sirens blaring in the Pillar Security Car, survey for enemies with the Blue Chip Detector and take an Assassin’s Creed-style leap of faith as you explore Abstergo’s shadowy influence in Haven." Read more  ( 16 min )
    Women in Games' new guide hopes to tackle gender underrepresentation and "dysfunctional work cultures"
    Women in Games has published a revised guide with 150+ pages of "information, inspiration, resources, first-hand accounts, case studies, recommendations, and more" for companies interested in "engaging with, and advancing, gender equality and wider diversity and inclusion". The organisation - which is self-described as "activists" that believe "getting more women into games and esports should be a national, international and strategic priority" - says Building A Fair Playing Field "is very specifically focused on gender, it encompasses wider intersectional issues of inclusivity and diversity, and can be used to address them at every level". Written by Women in Games CEO Marie-Claire Isaaman and Women in Games education & research consultant Sharon Tolaini-Sage, the guide hopes to address persistent wide scale issues of gender inequality, highlight the role of leadership in achieving fairness, provide inspiration for companies and individuals, and encourage and enable change. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Days Gone is getting a movie adaptation
    Days Gone is the next Sony game to be getting a film adaptation. According to Deadline, the movie will be written by Oscar-nominated Sheldon Turner, with Sam Heughan - who plays Outlander's Jamie Fraser - reportedly in consideration for the lead role of Deacon St. John. The movie will be produced by Jennifer Klein and Turner's production company, Vendetta Productions, whilst Asad Qizilbash and Carter Swan will be producing on behalf of Sony PlayStation Productions. Read more  ( 15 min )
    This Saints Row mural celebrates the UK's most entrepreneurial city
    In an effort to promote the Saints Row reboot - which releases next week - game developer Plaion commissioned research to find out where Brits aged 18-30 were most entrepreneurial: and Leeds topped the list. Consequently, a Saints Row-inspired mural celebrating Leeds' position as a, uh, "Boss Factory" is now available to see on Sackville Street, located inbetween the Meanwood and Little London areas of the Yorkshire city. Designed by street artist Captain Kris, it'll be there for the next month or so. "The research was inspired by the themes of the game where you and your three friends take on lawless factions in a fight for power and embark on a journey to make your own way in the world as your own boss," explained Plaion's marketing director, Simon Turner. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Yakuza fans can pre-order this new Kazuma Kiryu statue now
    We already know gaming merchandiser Numskull is busy building collectible figurines for a host of our favourite franchises, including Destiny, Silent Hill, and Resident Evil, but this week we discovered the next game character to get a replica will be Yakuza's Kazuma Kiryu. Officially licensed by Sega, the Ryū ga Gotoku/Yakuza Statue is a "highly detailed replica statue, from the paintwork to Kiryu’s bicycle itself" and stands at an impressive 10.5" (26.7cm) tall. It also include a "intricate" base "with classic Yakuza props from the game". Here's a teaser video with all the details and close-ups: Read more  ( 15 min )
    Borderlands' Moxxi's blended scotch whiskey is back in stock
    Good news for Borderlands fans who like a tipple - Moxxi's Finest whiskey is back in stock. Developed in conjunction with Ballatine's, Moxxi's Finest is Moxxi's "very own exclusive bottle of whiskey". "Like most things in life", the re-released Ballantine’s x Moxxi Bar Edition is available to buy now on a first come, first served basis. Players who manage to grab a bottle will also get access to "four exclusive and playable in-game heads from Pandora" courtesy of a QR code on the bottle. Read more  ( 16 min )
    A developer is banned from its game's own Steam forum for flaming other users
    A developer has been banned from its game's own Steam forum after repeatedly violating the platform's discussion rules and guidelines. Developer Dolphin Barn Incorporated - which caught our eye when it slipped anti-mask rhetoric into its patch notes earlier this year - shared a screenshot of his ban on Twitter, which said: "This is the second time that one of your posts violates our discussion rules and guidelines, specifically insulting or flaming another user. "We're also noticing a trend with abusive messages sent when banning players from your hub. When posting any content in the Community or communicating with your players, please make sure it adheres to the guidelines." Read more  ( 15 min )
    How do you make an entire game about bags? Backpack Hero: "Hold my potion"
    I've never really stopped to think about how you'd make an entire game about backpacks before, probably because they're always there, in every RPG, and they're already a kind of game in themselves as you try to fit everything in. But how do you take that idea and spin it out into something big enough to fill a game in its own right? Backpack Hero has attempted an answer, and the answer here is 'make it a bit like a deck-building game', but there's some magic in there too. There's combat, which I didn't necessarily expect, and the way you engage with it is by putting things in your bag, or selecting things in your bag to use. Let's say you have a sword in there: if you click on it in battle, you'll use it. Let's say you have a shield in there: if you click it in battle, you'll add armour. This is how you attack and defend against enemies. The more complicated bit, which it took me a while to work out, are carvings. They behave a lot like cards in a deck: a selection are drawn each round and you summon (play) them into your bag to be used. Let's say you summon a Daisy Blade sword: it does damage when summoned and then again when activated like a normal weapon. Then it disappears after the battle until summoned again. You can increase your pool of carvings by dragging over new ones when offered them as rewards after battles. You can also remove them at merchants, which again, underlines the deck-building idea. Read more  ( 17 min )
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    Nvidia djupdyker i "Grace" och "Hopper" under nästa vecka
    Hårdvarutillställningen Hot Chips går av stapeln på måndag nästa vecka, och Nvidia lovar att berätta mer om bolagets första serverprocessor och färska grafikarkitektur.  ( 5 min )
    Helgsnack: Minnesvärda buggar
    Ibland går saker inte riktigt som planerat och resultaten kan bli underhållande, tragiska eller allmänt minnesvärda. I helgen blickar vi tillbaka och tjötar om buggar vi minns.  ( 5 min )
    Värmebölja i Kina leder till nedstängda kretsfabriker
    Med temperaturer norr om 40 °C och akut elbrist stängs kretsfabriker tillfälligt, något som bland annat påverkar Intel och Foxconn.  ( 5 min )
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    Death Stranding släpps på PC Game Pass den 23:e augusti
    Ryktena var sanna!  ( 6 min )
    FZ Play - Hårdkokta actionrollspelet Thymesia bekänner färg
    No content preview  ( 5 min )
    De klassiska NES-utvecklarna Sunsoft gör comeback
    Japansk spelpensionär gör återkomst.  ( 6 min )
    Mega Drive Mini 2 släppts i Europa den 27:e oktober
    Europeiska Sega-fans får en MEGA oktober.  ( 7 min )
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    Interconnect innovation key to satiating soaring demand for fiber capacity
    Traffic is growing 30 percent every year, there's no reason to believe that'll change, BT's Andrew Lord argues Every year the bandwidth that telecom networks carry increases by roughly 30 percent. To keep up, the interconnects on which these networks are built are going to need to get a whole lot smarter and more capable before long, BT's Andrew Lord said during his Hot Interconnects keynote early this week.…  ( 8 min )
    NASA builds for keeps: Voyager mission still going after 45 years
    Hopefully these probes won't end up as target practice for some aliens in a few centuries The most distant human-made objects, Voyager 1 and 2, are still cruising in interstellar space, more than 12 billion miles from Earth, as NASA today celebrates the 45th year of its longest-operating mission.…  ( 7 min )
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    Meteor Lake Support Lands Within The Intel Graphics Compiler "IGC"
    Intel's open-source Linux bring-up for Meteor Lake continues. The latest open-source patches on the Meteor Lake front are for the Intel Graphics Compiler (IGC) changes for these 14th Gen CPU graphics...  ( 5 min )
    Mesa Zink Improvements For OpenGL-On-Vulkan Reportedly Make It Faster Than Radeon OpenGL
    The latest Mesa 22.3-devel code for Zink's OpenGL on Vulkan implementation has hit an important milestone with the latest code refactoring: it looks like this OpenGL implementation atop the Vulkan API with the RADV driver is beginning to outpace AMD's RadeonSI Gallium3D driver providing native OpenGL support for Radeon GPUs...  ( 5 min )
    KDE's Dolphin Gets A Dedicated Selection Mode, Full-Screen Mode For Elisa
    KDE developers had another busy summertime week adding more features to their open-source desktop environment...  ( 4 min )
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    Proton Experimental fixes up Disgaea 5, OUTRIDERS, Warhammer: Vermintide 2
    Valve has released the latest version of Proton Experimental, which has multiple newly supported games and a few useful bug fixes included.  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Linux Mint 21 Review: The Best Distro Just Got a Little Better
    Linux Mint is undoubtedly the best distribution for the beginners. The Mint 21 release makes it a bit better in terms of features and functionalities.  ( 26 min )
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    Comic for 2022.08.20 - Parties
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )

  • Open

    Scientists use supercritical carbon dioxide to power the grid
    Sandia has been working on the project for more than a decade – now comes scaling When it comes to turning turbines, steam is out and supercritical carbon dioxide is in – as demonstrated by Sandia National Labs when it connected a closed-loop system to the local grid, supplying 10 kilowatts of power for nearly an hour. …  ( 5 min )
    GitHub Copilot may be perfect for cheating CompSci programming exercises
    Shakeup in teaching looms as code-completion tool lets students 'bring an Uzi to a knife fight' Microsoft's AI code-suggestion tool GitHub Copilot is showing itself to be so capable that educators may have to rethink how they teach computer science.…  ( 6 min )
    Ex-HP finance manager jailed after going on $5m spending spree using company plastic
    Tesla sedan, 46 Chanel bags, 16 Rolexes, and more equals three years behind bars Now-former HP finance manager Shelbee Szeto has been sentenced to three years in prison and ordered to forfeit more than 250 luxury items after she blew $5m on herself using company credit cards.…  ( 5 min )
    Microsoft looks beyond the US with Windows Subsystem for Android
    Realizes there's a big beautiful world out there and sets sail for Japan Microsoft has taken a tentative step to expand the Windows Subsystem for Android outside of the US by making the preview available in Japan.…  ( 5 min )
    Russian cosmonauts abort ISS spacewalk after suit power fluctuates
    Imagine how much Apple would charge for a power lead that long A spacewalk by a pair of cosmonauts working on the European robotic arm on the International Space Station ended prematurely due to battery power issues.…  ( 4 min )
    Weighing the less mainstream Ubuntu remixes: Including China's Kylin
    We look at the official flavors, but there are more out there Alongside the official flavors, some of Ubuntu's other remixes have new 22.04.1 versions out: Unity, Cinnamon, and Kylin.…  ( 7 min )
    Qualcomm readying new Arm server chip based on Nuvia acquisition
    AWS said to be taking an interest in homegrown silicon, meaning chipmaker must have a functional demo Chipmaker Qualcomm is said to be preparing to re-enter the Arm server market, based on technology the company gained from its acquisition of startup Nuvia last year.…  ( 5 min )
    Google shuts off IoT Core services shortly after announcing API stability commitments
    Customers could be better off with specialist providers and service partners, Chocolate Factory decides Google Cloud is turning off its IoT services as of August 2023, leaving customers with less than a year to find alternatives.…  ( 5 min )
    LibreOffice improves Microsoft compatibility with version 7.4
    If you absolutely must keep using those proprietary formats, walk this way Just over six months on from version 7.3, LibreOffice 7.4 Community has arrived, boasting improvements in Microsoft Office compatibility.…  ( 5 min )
    UK blocks sale of chip design software company to China
    Trail from Super Orange HK Holding Ltd leads back to National Integrated Circuit Industry Investment Fund The UK government has blocked the sale of a British chip design software outfit to a Chinese company, citing national security. The move is the latest step the government has taken in its increasingly defensive stance against foreign ownership of UK technology companies.…  ( 5 min )
    Google promises to adjust search algorithm to favor 'people-first content'
    Well now there's an idea In what may be a major shift, Google plans to revise its search algorithm to rank content crafted primarily for people rather than content designed to impress web crawlers and indexing bots.…  ( 5 min )
    MariaDB buys geospacial specialist CubeWerx
    Long list of open standards contributions part of journey to REST-based GIS stack, companies say Database vendor MariaDB has forked out an undisclosed sum for CubeWerx, a geospatial data specialist, in the hope of making make these features easier to build into data-hungry applications.…  ( 4 min )
    We were promised integrated packages. Instead we got disintegrated apps
    Not to mention the severely disadvantageous subscription model Something for the Weekend  I have an app whose sole purpose is to launch another app.…  ( 8 min )
    Mouse hiding in cable tray cheesed off its bemused user
    Who knows where all those cables go anyway? On Call  Welcome once again to On Call, The Register's ongoing chronicle of IT incidents that readers have managed to survive, divert or diminish, while emerging with reputations intact.…  ( 4 min )
    Two years on, Apple iOS VPNs still leak IP addresses
    Privacy, it's a useful marketing term *Offer does not apply in China Apple has left a VPN bypass vulnerability in iOS unfixed for at least two years, leaving identifying IP traffic data exposed, and there's no sign of a fix.…  ( 5 min )
    Australian wasps threaten another passenger plane, with help from COVID-19
    A350 saved from peril by sharp-eyed ground crew Australian wasps have once again brought a passenger aircraft to the brink of peril.…  ( 4 min )
    NASA selects 'full force' for probe into UFOs
    'We're placing a high priority on it' NASA is pushing ahead to recruit a panel of experts and publish a much-awaited report on unidentified aerial phenomenons (UAPs), all with a budget of up to $100,000.…  ( 5 min )
    Red Hat OpenShift adds heterogenous clusters mixing x86, Arm
    Tech preview is Azure-only for now, adding to previous AWS Arm adventures Red Hat has delivered a tech preview of its OpenShift containerization platform that can drive clusters spanning both x86 and Arm silicon.…  ( 4 min )
    Vietnam demands Big Tech localize data storage and offices
    Mandate goes into effect October 1, but industry players will have one year to comply Vietnam’s Ministry of Information and Communications updated cybersecurity laws this week to mandate Big Tech and telecoms companies store user data locally and control that data with local entities.…  ( 4 min )
    Solaris is in maintenance mode – but Oracle added a significant feature anyway
    Don’t Panic if you run terabytes of RAM and need to understand a dumped snapshot Oracle's Solaris operating system remains widely used, even though Big Red more or less froze development of the product in 2018 save for regular Support Repository Updates (SRUs) that add minor updates and bug fixes.…  ( 4 min )
    The truth about that draft law banning Uncle Sam buying insecure software
    There's always a get-out clause An attempt by lawmakers to improve parts of the US government's cybersecurity defenses has raised questions – and hackles – among infosec professionals.…  ( 6 min )
    $2.8m gene therapy treatment is America's most expensive drug ever
    Sure, it's pricey, but not using it would be more expensive, says drug maker A one-time gene therapy treatment recently approved by America's FDA is gaining attention not just for its clinical value, but for its price: at $2.8 million, Bluebird Bio's Zynteglo is the most expensive drug in US history.…  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    What are you playing this weekend?
    We're coming up on a very busy week, so we are relaxing this weekend with some games, and maybe a bit of wine, ahead of the coming deluge. You see, next week there are three interesting games-related showcases on the calendar. Sunday, during the Pokemon World Championships, there will be all sorts of Pokemon news dropped, even a tidbit on Scarlet and Violet. On Tuesday, there's the Destiny 2 Showcase with all sorts of information on the next expansion in the Light and Darkness saga: Lightfall. And of course, there's the big one: gamescom Opening Night Live on Wednesday, August 24. Read more  ( 16 min )
    What's old is new again: What the rise of 'Boomer Shooters' says about the FPS market
    Ion Fury is the latest in a long and enjoyable line of boomer shooters I’ve ticked off lately. The two of us were bound to intersect – me, a 36-year-old with a professional sideline in harping on about the ‘90s for gaming sites; Ion Fury, an uncomplicated corridor shooter running on Duke Nukem 3D’s old game engine. I played, I laughed, I rolled sprites of bombs at little cyborg heads on robot spider legs. And then I got to thinking. Why do we call them ‘boomer shooters’, anyway? They hark explicitly back to the past, definitely, but did you really have to be there at ground zero when id Software and 3D Realms were putting the first wave of 3D shooters out in order to enjoy games like Dusk, Graven, or Amid Evil? And given that anything ‘boomer’ is a denigration, however affectionate, do these titles really deserve such lightweight, novelty status? You can hear me saying ‘no’ to myself as you read those rhetorical/not-rhetorical questions, but then I would say that. I remember Euro 96, and when Freddos were 10p, or something. Probably the more interesting question is why the term is used by developers, publishers, and commentators alike. And I think it’s about long tail economics. Read more  ( 19 min )
    MultiVersus Season 1 arrived with a whimper, not a bang – but I still can’t stop playing
    The launch of MultiVersus Season 1 wasn’t really spectacular. If you’ve been playing the game regularly, in fact, there was practically nothing of note to really enjoy when the servers popped back online on Monday evening. There was a new battle pass – with a great new Garnet skin in it, I may add – but… not much else. Morty, from Rick & Morty, will be arriving in the game on August 23 – he wasn’t part of the roster when the Season kicked off. His abusive, drunk, genius grandfather, Rick, will join the brawl later down the line (no dates have been announced at the time of writing). On top of that, Season 1 promises two new modes – Classic Arcade and Ranked – and new cosmetics, besides. But, when it all started on Monday, we only got a new battle pass. At least we got both the free track and the premium one. But as big, new launches go for games with over 10 million players… it’s a bit light, no? There was no sense of jubilation, of achievement, of one of the biggest games of the year moving out of its pre-Season and into its first proper series. It was a wet whimper, not the explosive bang many were expecting. Read more  ( 18 min )
    MultiVersus debut tops the chart, Switch and PlayStation 5 doing rather well at retail- July 2022 NPD
    The NPD Group has released its July 2022 report covering video game hardware, software, and accessory sales in the US. According to the NPD, total videogame industry spending declined 9% year-over-year (yoy) to $4.18 billion. Year-to-date spending declined 10% to $30.5 billion yoy, with subscription content remaining the only major spending category seeing growth. For the month of July, hardware sales increased by 12% yoy to $362 million. However, year-to-date spending on hardware fell 7% to $2.5 billion. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Some people archive video games for a living – here’s what they feel about the state of game preservation
    Before the Spyro Reignited Trilogy released in 2018, it came to light that series creator Insomniac Games didn’t have any of the trilogy’s original source code. So when there was a complete change of development staff and rights holder for Spyro with Toys For Bob and Activision, you’d think that creating a remastered collection would be an impossible task. Toys For Bob developed a tool called “The Spyro Scope,” which allowed the team to pull data on each game from the original trilogy as it was running – giving them every variable they would need to stitch each title back together and tap into the authentic Spyro experience. After release, Activision noted that the trilogy had a “successful launch,” and that it highlighted “the enduring nature of Activision’s classic franchises”. The everlasting economic power of nostalgia had been proven once again. Read more  ( 22 min )
    Call of Duty: Vanguard and Warzone's fifth and final season has you playing the villain
    Last Stand, the fifth and final season of Call of Duty: Vanguard and Call of Duty: Warzone, arrives on August 24 for a finale full of content. Call of Duty villains are out for revenge and are under orders from crime lord Raul Menendez. It's up to you to pick a side in the Heroes vs. Villains Community Event, defend or sabotage Caldera in Operation: Last Call, deploy to two new Multiplayer maps, and return to Egypt in the new round-based Zombies experience. For the event, you will choose between Raul Menendez, Khaled Al-Asad, Gabriel T. Rorke, and He “Seraph” Zhen-Zhen. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Kirby’s Dream Buffet review: When you want a tasty treat rather than a banquet
    The pink puff ball is back in 3D again, and you could argue that Kirby is certainly continuing to go mouthful mode in Kirby’s Dream Buffet. Rather than inhaling the likes of cars and vending machines in The Forgotten Land, Kirby and their colourful clones (as well as plenty of CPU Waddle Dees!) must race to eat as many strawberries as possible on an assault course made of food. If you saw the trailer and thought that Dream Buffet looked like Kirby met up with Fall Guys, you’re completely correct. But this mash-up isn’t as successful as I’d hoped. Each Gourmet Grand Prix – which includes a mixture of modes such as Race, Minigame, or Battle Royale – comes with its own tasting menu to manoeuvre, full of various desserts, burgers, or everything you’d need for the perfect fry-up. They’re all designed to look perfectly sumptuous as multiple Kirby characters roll around them, but I reached the end of each banquet wishing for a little more. Kirby’s Dream Buffet isn’t a bad game by any means. It’s another Kirby title without any skill hurdle that can provide plenty of Kirby-themed party game fun to those who jump in, but sadly, it's not a party game that I feel is going to be pulled out of the kitchen cabinet very often. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Wave Race 64 is a true classic, and an essential play on Nintendo Switch
    Nintendo’s Switch Online N64 service adds one of the best - but perhaps somewhat underappreciated – racing games on the system this week. Released in the N64’s launch window, Wave Race 64 was as much of a tech demo for Nintendo’s new 64-bit system as Super Mario 64, with the beautiful transparent ocean and realistic waves wowing any gamer who saw it, much like F-Zero’s Mode 7 tour-de-force did a generation before it. Shigeru Miyamoto himself maintains that Wave Race 64’s water uses ‘80% of the N64’s power’ but despite this, the game is more than just a fancy tech demo. As an N64 first party exclusive, Wave Race 64 was designed to work tightly with the hardware – not just in regards to the obvious visual and technical feats, but how it took full advantage of the then fairly new concept of analog control. One of the best sensations in any racing game is when you pull the stick down towards you, either slightly left or right, and have the jet ski carve through the water and turn back on itself. It’s almost impossible to describe accurately, but it is so intuitive and instinctive. It just feels right. You can jump into the Dolphin Park training course with zero knowledge of the controls and within minutes of just experimenting and playing aroun, you’ll know exactly what you can and can’t get away with when it comes to the handling and begin to start tearing across the water. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Diablo is turning into Call of Duty – and that sucks
    For anyone looking forward to Diablo 4 simply being a good video game – one you can have hours of fun playing and feel happy (not compelled) to return to anytime you choose – I’ve got bad news for you. In the recently published Diablo 4 quarterly development update, Blizzard came out and answered the billion-dollar question: how is Diablo 4 going to be monetised? Everyone is on edge, clearly, but not just thanks to how Diablo Immortal’s unethical monetisation was received, but also because Diablo 4 will be released at a time when game monetisation schemes have evolved beyond the point of parody. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Valorant announces new Champions bundle, event pass, and Twitch drops, here's how to claim
    Over the course of the past year, multiple teams across the world have gone head to head to try and claim one of the 16 spots in the Valorant Champions Tour. This is the ultimate Valorant tournament, and will be kicking off on August 31, running until September 18. To celebrate the tourney and all those involved, Valorant is releasing a Champions 2022 bundle, a free event pass, and various Twitch and YouTube drops so that your average player need not miss out on any of the fun. First things first, the limited edition Champions 2022 bundle will no doubt go down a treat. The last Champions cosmetic we saw was for the Vandal and karambit, and it still remains one of the more popular picks among players because of it's exclusivity and slick look. This time around, we're being given a glossy Phantom that I have no doubt will be just as admired. Read more  ( 16 min )
    VG247's The Best Games Ever Podcast – Ep.13: Best game that was called a clone of another game
    My daughter has a favourite toy. It's a Squishmallow called Serene. Serene is a round-ish turquoise squirrel. If you're not into soft toys, you may not know how popular Squishmallows are, but to give you an idea... the last time I was in the local toy shop, every one of the four people in the queue to pay had hold of a Squishmallow. But the popularity of Squishmallows isn’t the point of this little story. Serene goes everywhere with my daughter and is her best friend - as much as a wannabe toddler can have a best friend. Given how Serene can sometimes be thrown from the buggy with the complete lack of foresight and comprehension of possible events that only a baby has, and the extreme love she has for her, we thought it best to buy a second Serene. "Let's buy a clone of Serene, a new one, just in case," I said to my wife while browsing the toy store and walking past the sizable Squishmallow display. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Death Stranding is coming to PC Game Pass – but definitely not Xbox Game Pass
    In an announcement directly from Antonela Pounder, global community director for 505 Games, it has been revealed that Death Stranding will be arriving on PC Game Pass on August 23, 2022. You might recall that just a few days ago, PC Game Pass shared a small teaser to Twitter for a game they were adding. Immediately, many had their suspicions that the game could be Death Stranding. Now, we know they're completely correct. Death Stranding takes place in an apocalyptic United States. When an event known as 'Death Stranding' shakes earth to it's core, a bunch of Beached Things – strange, invisible monsters – start showing up. These BT's cause havoc, so much so that the remainder of humanity is in imminent danger, and it's up to Sam Porter Bridges to travel back and forth in a bid to save everyone from extinction. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Blizzard is extremely keen to tell us how Diablo 4 isn't like Diablo Immortal
    For some reason, the Diablo 4 developers are very keen to reiterate to people that the game will not be pay-to-win, and that players will not have to spend real money in order to bolster their characters and make meaningful in-game progress. In a new quarterly update released last night, Diablo 4‘s director of product, Kegan Clark, noted that any items that can be purchased for real money in the game's shop will impact gameplay. "Nothing offered in the Shop grants a direct or indirect gameplay advantage," says Clark. "So, while many of these may look like powerful pieces of gear, they have no in-game stats." Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    Roller skates, guns and slick tricks — Rollerdrome is awesome
    Rollerdrome is a thoroughly odd blending of mechanics and style found in the likes of Tony Hawk Pro Skater, a little Jet Set Radio and Max Payne.  ( 5 min )
    Tactical battler Tyrant's Blessing is out now with Linux support and Steam Deck Verified
    Did you enjoy Into the Breach and other similar small-scale strategy games? Tactical battler Tyrant's Blessing has released along with Native Linux support and it's Steam Deck Verified.  ( 4 min )
    Roadwarden is going to be a unique text adventure worth your time
    Roadwarden is an illustrated text adventure that I've played the demo of a few times through its development, and it's finally getting a release.  ( 4 min )
    YouTube thought my Steam Deck video was 'harmful and dangerous'
    Here is your daily dose of what the heck? YouTube and the mighty algorithm decided for no apparent reason, that my Steam Deck video was "harmful and dangerous".  ( 4 min )
    Witchtastic gets Steam Deck Verified after the dev made improvements
    As time goes on, more developers are tweaking their games to improve the Steam Deck experience and Witchtastic looks like a fun co-op game to try out.  ( 4 min )
    Dead Cells price hike in Argentina & Turkey due to cross-region purchases
    Motion Twin / Evil Empire have announced that Dead Cells is increasing in price in Argentina & Turkey, as it seems too many people were taking advantage of the cheaper prices from other countries.  ( 4 min )
    Capes is a gritty superpowered turn-based strategy RPG from ex-Hand of Fate devs
    Love your superhero stuff? Keep an eye on Capes, an upcoming turn-based strategy RPG full of people with superpowers.  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Behold this award-winning image of fungus making a fly its “zombie” slave
    Plus eight other winning images in 2022 BMC Ecology and Evolution image competition.  ( 6 min )
    Botometer creator says Musk’s Twitter spam estimate “doesn’t mean anything”
    With Botometer tool, you can "choose any threshold... to get any result you want."  ( 6 min )
    Ethereum’s “Merge” is about to put every ether miner out of work
    The ambitious change is expected to cut energy consumption by a factor of 1,000.  ( 6 min )
    Lucid gives the Air a sporty makeover, launches new Sapphire sub-brand
    At $249,000, the Lucid Air Sapphire will be a rare thing indeed.  ( 5 min )
    Qualcomm is jumping back into the server CPU market with Nuvia acquisition
    Nuvia—a company founded by ex-Apple CPU engineers—will also tackle server designs.  ( 5 min )
    Debit card fraud leaves Ally Bank customers, small stores reeling
    Some are seeing charges on cards they've never activated or hardly used.  ( 6 min )
    Lenovo sends cease-and-desist to Framework over a stylized letter “O”
    Company says Framework's 3D-printed motherboard case infringes its trademark.  ( 5 min )
    Scientists are figuring out how to destroy “forever chemicals”
    One class of PFAS chemicals can be broken down into harmless compounds with lye.  ( 5 min )
    Sega packs unreleased games, new arcade ports into Genesis Mini 2
    Full 60+ game list also includes some Genesis classics with new gameplay features.  ( 7 min )
    Library’s prized Galileo manuscript turns out to be a clever forgery
    All signs point to notorious 20th-century forger.  ( 6 min )
    Review: HP’s Elite Dragonfly Chromebook is the cream of the ChromeOS crop
    Easily one of the best Chromebooks you can buy, but it could use a price drop.  ( 6 min )
    Rocket Report: Europe wants a super-heavy lifter, Starship nets launch contract
    "We are definitely seeing significant attrition. That should surprise no one."  ( 11 min )
  • Open

    Emmanuel Kasper: Everything markdown with pandoc
    Using a markdown file , this style sheet and this simple command, pandoc couronne.md --standalone --css styling.css \ --to html5 --table-of-contents > couronne.html I feel I will never need a word processor again. It produces this nice looking document without pain.  ( 5 min )
    Dirk Eddelbuettel: RcppArmadillo 0.11.2.3.1 on CRAN: Double Update
    Armadillo is a powerful and expressive C++ template library for linear algebra and scientific computing. It aims towards a good balance between speed and ease of use, has a syntax deliberately close to Matlab, and is useful for algorithm development directly in C++, or quick conversion of research code into production environments. RcppArmadillo integrates this library with the R environment and language–and is widely used by (currently) 1005 packages other packages on CRAN (as celebrated in this blog post on passing 1000 packages from just four days ago), downloaded nearly 26 million times (per the partial logs from the cloud mirrors of CRAN), and the CSDA paper (preprint / vignette) by Conrad and myself has been cited 488 times according to Google Scholar. This release brings together tw…  ( 4 min )
    Reproducible Builds (diffoscope): diffoscope 221 released
    The diffoscope maintainers are pleased to announce the release of diffoscope version 221. This version includes the following changes: * Don't crash if we can open a PDF file with PyPDF but cannot parse the annotations within. (Closes: reproducible-builds/diffoscope#311) * Depend on the dedicated xxd package, not vim-common. * Update external_tools.py to reflect xxd/vim-common change. You find out more by visiting the project homepage.
  • Open

    Släppdatumet för Sonic Frontiers kan ha läckt i marknadsföringsmaterial
    Och även det faktum att DLC redan planeras.  ( 6 min )
    Final Fantasy XVI-producenten vet att alla inte kommer att gilla spelet
    Framför allt med tanke på de mer actionorienterade striderna.  ( 7 min )
    Ny trailer för Portal-doftande The Entropy Center
    Med tidsmanipulation istället för portaler, men kuberna finns kvar!  ( 6 min )
    Det här spelar FZ i helgen - Vad spelar du?
    Avancerade krigsspel och storslagna remakes. Här finns något för alla.  ( 7 min )
    FZ Play streamar Sir Whoopass - vinn spelet, chatta med utvecklare!
    No content preview  ( 6 min )
    Diskutera - Hur ska nästa FZ-redaktör vara?
    No content preview  ( 6 min )
    Knights of the Old Republic-remaken kan ha bytt utvecklare
    Paus-ryktet kanske bara var en fråga om utvecklarbyte.  ( 6 min )
    Regiments
    FZ:s Johan Olander upptäcker att kalla kriget är stekhett, supersvårt och svinskoj.  ( 9 min )
    Efter fem år - Quake Champions lämnar early access
    Gibba gratis på Steam och pc-Game Pass.  ( 6 min )
    Nu på pc-Game Pass - Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Quake 4 med mera
    Och Quake Champions och två GAMLA Elder Scrolls är gratis i MS Store.  ( 6 min )
    Arkane Austin går igenom vad Redfall faktiskt är
    Spoiler: Ett handlingsdrivet FPS i en öppen spelvärld för solo- eller gruppspelare.  ( 7 min )
    Nu är Doom 64 och ett innehållspaket till Rumbleverse gratis hos Epic
    Helgen är räddad?  ( 6 min )
    Nu är Doom 64 och Rumbleverse gratis hos Epic
    Helgen är räddad?  ( 6 min )
    Blizzard försäkrar: Inget pay-to-win i Diablo IV
    Och som i Diablo III börjar man med en ny karaktär varje säsong.  ( 7 min )
    Rick and Morty-skaparens FPS High on Life försenas
    Squanch Games behöver mer tid för sitt kommande spel.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    RTX 3060 Laptop Deals: All the Models You Can Buy Right Now
    We help you find RTX 3060-powered gaming laptop deals.  ( 63 min )
    Asus Unveils Trio of AMD X670E AM5 Motherboards For Zen 4
    Asus announces rough and tough AM5 motherboards for AMD's Ryzen 7000-series Zen 4 CPUs.  ( 63 min )
    Intel Raptor Lake Specs Allegedly Exposed: Up To 24 Cores, 32 Threads
    An almost fully fledged Raptor Lake CPU product table highlights the evolution to expect moving from Alder Lake. Some chips seem to fare better than others across the gen-to-gen transition.  ( 60 min )
    Bitcoin Falls Under $21.4K, Traders Lose $600 Million
    Bitcoin has followed the general trading markets in its fall to three-week lows of $21,400: the sharpest decline over two months. In addition, expectations of a hawkish fed and more aggressive moves against inflation have reduced investor confidence.  ( 59 min )
    MSI's Tiger Lake Motherboard Would Be So Much Cooler If It Had a PCIe Slot
    MSI has created a new low-profile Mini-ITX motherboard featuring a Core i5 Tiger Lake processor for professionals desiring to build a compact desktop workstation that sips power.  ( 60 min )
    Nvidia Details Grace Hopper CPU Superchip Design: 144 Cores on 4N TSMC Process
    Nvidia shared more details about the Nvidia Grace CPU and Nvidia Grace Hopper CPU Superchip at Hot Chips 34.  ( 67 min )
    AMD Genoa 96-Core CPU Towers Over Intel Sapphire Rapids 56-Core CPU In 2P System Benchmark
    In the battle of the following gen 2P server systems, AMD leads, despite Cinebench R23 rendering maxing out at 125C/256T - leaving 64C/128T of untapped potential.  ( 63 min )
    Gigabyte Announces Aorus PCIe 5.0 SSD Up To 12.4 GBps
    Gigabyte unveils its client PCIe 5.0 x4 SSD with up to 12.4 GBps throughput.  ( 59 min )
    Pimoroni Enviro Indoor Review: Sense and Sensor-Abilities
    How warm is it? Is the air too humid? Are there volatile organic compounds in the air? Enviro Indoor will help you find out.  ( 65 min )
    Raspberry Pi Manufacturer RS Group Ends License After a Decade
    RS Components had been a manufacturer and distributor of Raspberry Pi since its launch in 2012.  ( 60 min )
  • Open

    The 2022 video game release schedule is getting worse every single week
    You know what it's like at the beginning of a new year. You're all excited about the many tens and hundreds of new video games coming out over the next 12 months, and you go and make a big list of all the ones you're really looking forward to. We did exactly that back in January of this year, coming up with a list of our 43 most anticipated games of 2022. Lately, though, it seems we can't go a single day without word of yet another game being delayed, whether it's just by a couple of months, or that it's been taken off the calendar entirely. It got me thinking. How many of those 43 games are even still on the table this year? And, more importantly, what does that mean for RPS as we head into the back-end of 2022? Well, I went back and counted, folks, and it's not great reading. At time of writing, just over half that number - 27 in total - are still slated for a 2022 release right now, although with many still listed as a very vague '2022' or 'Coming Soon' on their Steam pages, I wouldn't be surprised if that number fell further. Needless to say, I'm not sure 2022 will go down as one of the great gaming years... 2023, on the other hand? Wow, that's looking rad. Read more  ( 16 min )
    How Stellaris has taken on new life over its six-year strategy journey
    Galactic alliances aren’t built in a day, a month or even a year, to warp a comfortingly familiar phrase from 90s telly. Interplanetary 4X Stellaris has been evolving for more than six years now, having first released on May 9th 2016. Unusually, I remember exactly when I bought the game, because it was in the days just before my partner and I welcomed our first child. Being a ginormous sci-fi nerd, I enthusiastically downloaded it thinking I’d have all the space-time in the universe to invest in building my own interstellar superpower. I did dip my toes in back then, and have many, many times since, but rather naively didn’t foresee the inevitable. The structure of my life altered dramatically with the arrival of our baby. It didn’t stop there either, and still hasn’t, taking on some unfamiliar but just about recognisable form every few months. I suspect the developers of Stellaris had a similar feeling following the game’s release into the wider universe, like Kubrick’s giant cosmic infant at the end of 2001: A Space Odyssey. I know I’ve felt like my furniture’s been rearranged whenever I’ve started a new game of Stellaris with a different civilisation over the intervening years. Read more  ( 21 min )
    Ultimate Audio Bang #24: our pick of the best FPS guns that aren't guns
    On this week's episode of the Ultimate Audio Bang, we select a few of our favourite non-traditional guns that aren't really guns. You know, the sorts of weapons that don't just spew bullets but generate portals or even clean filth off car bonnets. What really happens is we go off on a massive tangent about Deathloop, because we can't help ourselves. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Yep, Death Stranding is coming to PC Game Pass
    Earlier this week, the official Game Pass Twitter account was playing silly buggers with their profile pic, stating that "sometimes we just like a good landscape picture". Immediately, internet sleuths deduced that the landscape in question looked suspiciously like Death Stranding, leading many to believe it was a teaser for Kojima's hiking postal sim appearing on the subscription service. And yep, they were right on the money, with confirmation arriving today that the BB Boys will be pulling into Game Pass next week, on August 23rd. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Thymesia has spectacular combat, but falls short of true Soulslike greatness
    Where FromSoftware's offerings weave a mysterious tale, wonderful level design, and meaningful combat into a tight package, Thymesia – like so many other Soulslikes - knows it must excel at one thing to compensate for the others. I've spent some time with the game's early levels and it perfectly captures what I'd consider to be a 'classical' Soulslike: a game that's heavily focused on The Combat Bit above all else. Does the game's combat rule? Yes, without a doubt. But will I continue playing? I'm not so sure. From what I've sampled, one strong pillar might not be enough to hold my attention for much longer. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Cursed To Golf review: a charming golf sim that's stuck in roguelike purgatory
    Golf games seem to be having a bit of a renaissance right now. From their beginnings on the fairway fringes of Flash-game forums, we now have been blessed with a handful of fun indie golf sims. We’ve seen the bizarre buffoonery of What The Golf?, the high-speed, eye-popping courses of Golf With Your Friends, and Secret Mode recently completely threw the clubs out the window and replaced them with highspeed motorcars in Turbo Golf Racing. It's safe to say that golfing games are always full of shenanigans and Cursed To Golf is no different. Playing as a golfer who has been cast into Golf Purgatory, you need to golf your way back to the land of the living, completing all eighteen holes in one roguelike run. It’s a fun premise and the game bursts with silliness and personality, but unfortunately Cursed To Golf fails to iron out certain roguelike frustrations. After mistiming a shot in the game’s final area and being sent back to the beginning (ending an excruciating four-hour run time), I truly did feel cursed. Read more  ( 20 min )
    The Batman Arkham subreddit has decreed that Batman: Arkham World exists and is cool
    I'm a big fan of shared, collective funtimes, so I must lay flowers at the feet of posters on the Batman Arkham subreddit (maybe not flowers; like, bat-themed knives and big stompy boots. I don't know, what does Batman like?). A couple of weeks ago, with no new mainline Arkham game since 2015's Arkham Knight, they started discussing Batman: Arkham World, a fourth game in the series that came out in 2021. Except, of course, it does not exist. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Quakecon sees Wolfenstein 3D, Quake 4 and more Bethesda classics come to Game Pass
    Quakecon started yesterday and to celebrate Microsoft have added another swathe of id Software and Bethesda games to both PC Game Pass and the Microsoft Store. That's not all, either, as there's also an id-themed freebie over on the Epic Games Store this week, and more Bethesda games going cheap in various sales. Here's everything you need to know about what's going on where. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Quake's enhanced edition now includes the classic Capture The Flag mod
    There was a time in multiplayer first-person shooters when Capture The Flag modes were as ubiquitous as Battle Royales. Also like Battle Royales, it was a mod that was responsible for that ubiquity: Threewave CTF for Quake. Now you can more easily play Threewave CTF again. Bethesda announced during Quakecon today that Threewave Capture The Flag was now part of their enhanced Quake release, with nine maps, the grappling hook and new improvements. Read more  ( 16 min )
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    Fortnite Lord of the Rings Easter egg sets fan tongues wagging
    Fortnite fans have spotted a sneaky Lord of the Rings Easter egg in-game, sparking speculation of a fresh crossover. The potential tease can be found on one of the Fortnite island's beaches, where a small-scale replica of the Helm's Deep castle can be seen. Is this a tease of a future collaboration, perhaps timed to coincide with Amazon's upcoming, billion-dollar Lord of the Rings prequel TV show? Or is this developer Epic Games simply having some fun? Read more  ( 16 min )
    Redfall has Arkane's biggest map yet
    Redfall's map will be the largest in any of Arkane Austin's games to date, the developer has said in a new video. Karen Segars, art director at Arkane, described the setting as quaint and small, despite the fact that Redfall will be its "biggest" game. Talos One, the setting for Prey 2017, is dwarfed by a farm area players visit in one of Redfall's early missions, Studio director Harvey Smith recalled. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The all-new Digital Foundry website is now live
    It gives me great pleasure to announce that the Digital Foundry website has just relaunched - and you can access it right now at digitalfoundry.net. While Eurogamer is, of course, the home for DF's written words, our bespoke site is all about showcasing our video content while offering a bunch of benefits to backers of our Supporter Program. High quality video downloads, exclusive content, early access opportunities - this is the place to be if you like what Digital Foundry does and want to support our efforts. So what's new, exactly? Let's start with a little history first. In late 2016, the enhanced/pro consoles arrived, signalling the era of 4K games - so I came up with the idea of supplying our 4K videos in the form of high quality downloads, since YouTube didn't cut the mustard quality-wise (and not much has changed there). It was also an experiment to see what kind of support we could get from the audience - bearing in mind how much work goes into our projects, how many people would like to support our endevours? Last year, we took stock of our efforts and decided to revamp the whole thing, concentrating on building a community, offering more access to the team, providing more exclusive content - and of course, seeking to fund massive DF Retro projects, like testing out a whole generation's worth of 1080p games on PlayStation 3. The missing piece of the puzzle? Reflecting everything we were doing on our website. Now, thanks to herculean efforts from the ReedPop tech team, we've got the site we always wanted, bringing together our wish to show off all of our videos, to integrate more deeply with the various Patreon tiers we have, while at the same time addressing quality-of-life requests from the audience such as chronological lists of new videos, RSS feeds and an actual search function. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order book spin-off to set up sequel
    Fans of Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, take note. The game's upcoming sequel, due sometime next year, will be preceded by an official tie-in novel bridging the gap between the two games. Star Wars Jedi: Battle Scars will be written by Sam Maggs, who has previously penned books and comics for Marvel and DC, plus video games such as Tiny Tina's Wonderland and, fittingly, the upcoming Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic remake. Set between Jedi: Fallen Order and next year's Jedi: Survivor, it will once again follow series protagonist Cal Kestis and the crew of the Mantis. Look for it to hit bookshelves on 7th March next year. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Microsoft reportedly spent $600k to get Cooking Simulator on Xbox Games Pass
    It looks like Microsoft made a high steaks deal to get the indie Cooking Simulator onto Xbox Games Pass. A filing from Polish developer Big Cheese Studio (translated by Twisted Voxel) reveals it was paid $600k by Microsoft, a result of which saw the game making its way onto Xbox's subscription service. This turned out to be a pretty great deal for the Polish studio, as the money it received from Microsoft was the equivalent of 22 percent of the company's entire revenue during the previous fiscal year. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Kena: Bridge of Spirits headed to Steam next month
    Impressive-looking adventure Kena: Bridge of Spirits will come to Steam for the first time next month, on 27th September. That date roughly marks a year since Kena first debuted on PC via the Epic Game Store, as well as on PlayStation. To celebrate this, a fresh Steam listing for the game now includes details of a fittingly-titled Anniversary Update. This will add a New Game Plus mode, an enhanced photo mode, new outfits and more. Read more  ( 15 min )
    NES developer Sunsoft announces plans for return
    Sunsoft, the Japanese developer behind a bunch of NES classics, has announced plans for a comeback. The veteran company - originally founded in 1978 - will relaunch a trio of its classic games for modern consoles over the next year. First off will be Ikki Unite, a co-op multiplayer remake based on the original Ikki for NES. This will stick closer to the developer's original vision for the project, Sunsoft says, and launch soon via a closed beta on Steam. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Slime Rancher 2 hits early access this September
    Slime Rancher 2 will be making its way into early access via Xbox and PC on 22nd September. The sequel to 2017's Slime Rancher will continue the story of Beatrix LeBeau. This time, she will see her adventures take her across the Slime Sea to the mysterious shores of Rainbow Island. Here, she will find a multitude of "wiggly, new slimes to wrangle". You can check out a trailer for the upcoming game below. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Don't expect to see more of Starfield at Gamescom
    Bethesda has updated a blog post which previously suggested we might see more of Starfield next week at Gamescom. Fan excitment was sparked this week by word that Redfall and Starfield gameplay would be shown at a Community Get Together to be held next Friday, 26th August. "Come see Redfall and Starfield gameplay and get your hands on Fallout 76 while you're there," the blog teased. "Of course, we also have a few surprises and goodies in store for you." Read more  ( 15 min )
    1m have already flocked to Cult of the Lamb
    Cult of the Lamb has had an amazing debut. Massive Monster's indie title, which tasks players with starting their own cult "in a land of false prophets", has seen an impressive 1m sales across consoles as of yesterday. This is even more remarkable when you take into account that the game has only been out for a week. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Death Stranding coming to PC Game Pass
    Hideo Kojima's Death Stranding will be added to Game Pass for PC next week, on Tuesday 23rd August at 1am UK time. Intriguingly, this appears to be the original version of the game, rather than its more recent Director's Cut. Published by 505 Games, the PC version of Death Stranding first arrived in July 2020, around eight months after it first popped up as a PlayStation 4 console exclusive. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Ooblets coming to Nintendo Switch this September
    Nintendo Switch players will soon be able to get their hands on adorable sim Ooblets. The game is due to come to Nintendo's console on 1st September, following its stint in early access on PC (via Epic) and Xbox. "We've been working on Ooblets... for the past SIX years and it's finally reaching 1.0," the developer tweeted earlier this week, before unveiling the game's Switch debut. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Sega battling Hyenas alpha gameplay leak
    Gameplay footage of Hyenas, the next title from Sega studio Creative Assembly, has leaked on YouTube. Hyenas was announced in June and has since had three closed alphas. Anyone taking part in the alpha is required to sign an NDA. Yesterday, an hour of footage from the alpha was uploaded to YouTube. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Cult of the Lamb was not blocked from Game Pass, despite claims to the contrary
    Earlier this month, it was reported that Sony had been blocking games from going onto Microsoft's Xbox Game Pass subscription service. The type of games this was affecting was never specified, however screenwriter Gary Whitta recently claimed that Sony had paid Cult of the Lamb's developer, Massive Monster, to stop the indie-hit from appearing on Xbox's service. The game's publisher Devolver Digital has now rebuked Whitta's statement. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Blizzard really wants to reassure you on Diablo 4's monetisation
    Diablo 4 developer Blizzard has issued a lengthy blog post describing the kinds of things you'll be able to spend money on in its upcoming dungeon crawler - and things you won't. It's the latest round of reassurance from Blizzard on Diablo 4 following the controversial monetisation of its recent free-to-play spin-off Diablo Immortal, in which players have argued you can pay extortionate amounts and become more powerful. By contrast, Diablo 4 will feature a cosmetics shop and season pass - "none of which provide any pay-for-power options", Diablo 4 product director Kegan Clark said. Read more  ( 15 min )
    In praise of the video game starter island
    I can still remember my first game of PUBG. Well, kind of. I can't remember how I did out there on the battlefield, which weapons I found or how far I traveled across the map. But I can remember that starter island - where everyone spawns while the game is gathering players. I remember just being really confused by it. Where was I? Was this it? Were we off and playing? Did I need to be doing something? There were weapons scattered around - should I be using them? There were people everywhere. Should I be hiding? I am familiar with the starting island now - in fact I love it. I spend a lot of time in games that use starting islands, from Fortnite to Among Us (not really an island, that one, but you know what I mean). Read more  ( 17 min )
    What we've been playing
    Hello! Welcome back to our regular feature where we write a little bit about some of the games we've found ourselves playing over the last few days. This time: eternal war, cults, and a game that invokes Hungy Hungry Hippos. If you fancy catching up on some of the older editions of What We've Been Playing, here's our archive. Yes, it's on brand for me. Yes, it's a free-to-download mobile game with microtransactions. And yes, it's unnecessarily bloated, with more resources to collect and progression gates to grind through that even the Emperor himself might have lost patience. But I have found some fun in Warhammer 40,000 Tacticus, a fast-paced turn-based strategy game in the mobile phone mould that is scratching an itch I am somewhat depressed but unsurprised to find myself afflicted with. Read more  ( 19 min )
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    SDL 2.24 Released With New APIs, D3D12 Renderer Work On Windows, New Linux Hints
    SDL 2.24 has been released as the newest update to this widely-used abstraction layer library commonly used by cross-platform games, including heavily by games on Steam...  ( 5 min )
    Apple M2 vs. AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 6850U Performance In Nearly 200 Benchmarks
    Last week I published initial Apple M2 vs. AMD Rembrandt vs. Intel Alder Lake Linux benchmarks using Asahi Linux and Arch Linux across the board. For ending out this week, here is a follow-up article looking more closely at the Apple M2 in the MacBook Air against the AMD Ryzen 7 PRO 6850U "Rembrandt" within the Lenovo ThinkPad X13 Gen3.  ( 5 min )
    Radeon ROCm 5.2.3 Released With Ubuntu 20.04.5 Support, Various Library Fixes
    AMD has put out another point release in the ROCm 5.2 series for their "Radeon Open eCosystem" GPU compute stack for Linux...  ( 4 min )
    Mesa 22.2-rc3 Released With Many Fixes To TURNIP Vulkan, D3D9 Frontend
    The third weekly release candidate of Mesa 22.2 is now available for testing ahead of the stable debut in the coming weeks...  ( 4 min )
    Tow-Boot Downstream Of U-Boot Updated With Improved SMBIOS Support
    Tow-Boot 2021.10-005 is now available for this open-source project that describes itself as "an opinionated distribution of U-Boot."..  ( 4 min )
    GCC 12.2 Compiler Released With 70+ Bug Fixes
    Out this morning is version 12.2 of the GNU Compiler Collection...  ( 5 min )
    KDE Gear - KDE Applications - 22.08 Released
    For what used to be known as part of the KDE Software Compilation... Then most recently the straight-forward KDE Applications name to refer to the set of official KDE applications... Now KDE Gear is the current name for the official set of KDE applications. KDE Gear 22.08 is out today as the newest collection of KDE apps...  ( 4 min )
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    Fredagspanelen 263: Gigantiska skärmar, Spindelmannen och blixtsnabba SSD:er
    Jonas återvänder från semesterdimman och sluter upp med Calle i studion för att prata absurt stora datorskärmar samt ohälsosamt kabelsamlande i lådor.  ( 5 min )
    Apple varnar för säkerhetsbrist i Iphone
    Efter att säkerhetshål upptäckts i Apples enheter uppmanas användare att uppdatera sina telefoner så fort som möjligt.  ( 5 min )
    Geforce Now får högre upplösning i Chrome
    Nvidias spelstreamingtjänst Geforce Now har uppgraderats och prenumeranter har nu möjlighet att spela i 1440p via webbläsaren.  ( 5 min )
    Samsung förbereder DDR5-minne på 1 TB
    I början av nästa år ämnar Samsung att spränga terabyte-gränsen på en enskild minnesmodul.  ( 5 min )
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    Untitled
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    Laughing In Loud
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    Comic for 2022.08.19 - Pullover
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 2 min )
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    How to Create and Switch Workspaces in Linux Mint
    Workspaces are a great way to stay organized and productive. Here is how to create and use workspaces in Linux Mint Cinnamon.  ( 26 min )
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    Age Milestone Privileges
    No content preview  ( 1 min )

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    For the first time ever, more people watched streaming TV than cable
    The long-predicted shift finally happened.  ( 5 min )
    If everyone bicycled like the Danes, we’d avoid a UK’s worth of emissions
    Lower emissions and lower obesity would more than offset the added traffic deaths.  ( 6 min )
    Loathsome anti-vax group run by RFK Jr gets Meta permaban—finally
    CHD says the ban came "without warning." Meta says it followed many violations.  ( 5 min )
    Hands-on: Logitech’s tiny G705 wireless mouse is more versatile than it looks
    Decent power for traveling or small hands.  ( 6 min )
    FTC sued by firm allegedly selling sensitive data on abortion clinic visits
    The firm hopes stopping all health data collection will block the FTC's lawsuit.  ( 7 min )
    Motorola takes on the Pixel 6a with a 144 Hz mid-range phone
    The Moto Edge has a super-fast display, but can the MediaTek SoC keep up?  ( 5 min )
    Old laptop hard drives will allegedly crash when exposed to Janet Jackson music
    Problem has been assigned an official CVE ID, despite lack of specifics.  ( 5 min )
    Zoom patches critical vulnerability again after prior fix was bypassed
    MacOS security researcher was able to bypass the fix issued just last weekend.  ( 4 min )
    Netflix’s ad-supported plan likely to have another drawback: No video downloads
    Text found in iOS app code says plan won't allow downloads for offline viewing.  ( 6 min )
    Hundreds of cosmetic MultiVersus mods stop working in apparent crackdown
    Twitch streamers also hit for playing with modded characters like Jesus Christ.  ( 5 min )
    Ring patched an Android bug that could have exposed video footage
    After a chain of attacks, security firm got access to locations and recordings.  ( 5 min )
    Buttons beat touchscreens in cars, and now there’s data to prove it
    Swedish publication Vi Bilägare quantified the problem with new tests.  ( 7 min )
    Europe is seriously considering a major investment in space-based solar power
    Such an initiative would require a 200-fold increase over current space-lift capacity.  ( 5 min )
    Embracer acquires rights to Tolkien-related IP, teases new LOTR films
    Limited Run Games has also been acquired, along with five worldwide game studios.  ( 7 min )
    TikTok vows to close loophole letting users skirt ban on political ads
    The app is adding internal teams to review influencer posts for violations.  ( 6 min )
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    Intel's Core i5-13600HX Raptor Lake Mobile CPU Benchmarked: Faster Than Alder Lake
    First CrossMark results of Intel's Core i5-13600HX leak.  ( 59 min )
    Early AGESA Versions Responsible For Possible Ryzen 7000 Delayed Release
    AMD is reportedly dealing with serious AGESA microcode issues on its upcoming AM5 platform, which might delay Ryzen 7000's release window to late September.  ( 59 min )
    Samsung: 1TB DDR5 RAM in 2024, DDR5-7200 in 2025
    Samsung envisions 1TB DDR5 modules to arrive in 2024, DDR5-7200 to hit the market in 2025.  ( 65 min )
    Lenovo’s Lawyers Prompt Framework to Change 3D Printed Case
    Framework is changing the power button on its open source case design after a challenge from Lenovo claiming that it infringes upon Lenovo's Legion trademarks.  ( 59 min )
    Intel Factories in China Shut Down to Conserve Electrical Power
    Intel factories in China's Sichuan Province, have been shutd down in order to reduce the strain in the electrical grid.  ( 59 min )
    RTX 3070 Laptop Deals: All the Models You Can Buy Right Now
    We help you find RTX 3070-powered gaming laptop deals.  ( 63 min )
    Samsung 990 Pro Is the Center of a PCIe Mystery
    New evidence surrounding Samsung's 990 Pro SSD suggest it will be either a PCIe 4.0 or PCIe 5.0 drive.  ( 59 min )
    Raspberry Pi Backup System Saves Data to USB Drive
    ThinkLearnDo has created a Raspberry Pi-powered keychain holder that can back up data overnight to a USB thumb drive.  ( 59 min )
    Intel Core i9-13900KF QS Benchmarked at 6.1 GHz Using Liquid Cooling
    The Core i9 Raptor Lake chip jumps from being 39% to 59% faster than its Alder Lake predecessor thanks to the application of an improved cooling solution.  ( 63 min )
    Ubuntu Announces Compatibility With Second RISC-V System
    Ubuntu has a new home: the VisionFive RISC-V board from StarFive.  ( 59 min )
    GeForce Now Gets 1440p, 120 FPS Game Support for Chrome and Edge
    Nvidia updates its Chrome and Edge browser implementation of GeForce Now to support 1440p and 120 fps gameplay for members of the RTX 3080 plan.  ( 59 min )
    Intel's Raptor Lake Reportedly Has 350W Turbo Mode, But Only on New Motherboards
    New Intel 700-series motherboards to enable extreme turbo boost levels for Intel's 13th Generation Core processors.  ( 59 min )
    Bitcoin Mining Company Sells 26,200 Rigs to Eliminate $67M Debts
    Big crypto miners have racked up massive debts, but their hardware is still worth a lot of cash. However, SDIG is well placed for market swings as it also owns power generation plants too.  ( 59 min )
    Dell Pro Webcam (WB5023) Review: Perfect Plug-and-Play in 2K
    The Dell Pro webcam offers 2K QHD resolution and performs well without any image adjustments or software tweaks.  ( 67 min )
    Cooler Master GM27-FQS Review: Accurate Color and High Performance
    Cooler Master adds to its high-performance gaming monitor stable with the GM27-FQS. It’s a 27-inch QHD/IPS panel with 165 Hz, Adaptive-Sync, HDR10 and a wide gamut. With accurate color and smooth video processing, it’s ready to play.  ( 68 min )
    Janet Jackson's 'Rhythm Nation' Crashes Hard Drives
    A bizarre situation in which a Janet Jackson music video can crash a laptop has gained official recognition.  ( 59 min )
    Roccat Kone XP Air Review: Packed with RGB and Buttons
    The Roccat Kone XP Air does a pretty good job at drawing attention to itself with its eye-popping RGB and ergonomic design, but its $170 price tag is steep.  ( 63 min )
    Best RAM for Gaming: DDR4, DDR5 Kits for 2022
    Here are the best RAM kits we’ve tested: computer memory ideal for gaming, video editing, and graphics-heavy applications.  ( 74 min )
    Scammers Distribute Fake Microsoft Office USB Sticks With Malware
    Fraudsters send fake Microsoft Office USB drives to gain PC access and demand ransom.  ( 60 min )
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    Diablo 4 will have a season pass, cosmetic shop and years of post-release content
    Diablo 4 isn't due for release until next year, but in their latest quarterly update Blizzard have laid out their plans for post-release updates. Those plans include seasonal content, a paid season pass, and an in-game cosmetics shop. It's everything you'd expect (or exhaustedly resign yourself to) in a live service game. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Beacon Pines' verb-collecting storybook adventure launches September
    Several of my favourite games are basically just choose-your-own-adventure books and Beacon Pines makes that connection more explicit. It's an adventure game where you explore environments and unlock new words, which you can then deploy during pivotal story moments when the camera pulls back to reveal the whole game takes place on the pages of a book. It looks great, and it now has a release date: September 22nd. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Get an RTX 3060, RTX 3070 or RTX 3080 Ti graphics card for below UK RRP at Ebay
    Ebuyer's Ebay store and the BANK15 code are teaming up again for more low-as-all-heck prices on a range of Nvidia RTX graphics cards. We've already covered quite a few of these this week, I know, but these are genuinely historic price drops on cards that have been almost impossible to find at a reasonable price for most of their lifetime. Today we've got three further selections for you: an RTX 3060, an RTX 3070 and an RTX 3080 Ti. Let's take a look! Read more  ( 17 min )
    Dungeons & Dragons is getting an official virtual tabletop powered by Unreal Engine
    Over the past couple of years, software for playing tabletop roleplaying games remotely has become more popular than ever - for obvious reasons. Not content with people using third-party software such as Roll20, Wizards Of The Coast have announced today that they're making their own Dungeons & Dragons virtual tabletop using Unreal Engine 5. It looks pretty swish. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Grab 16GB of RGB-encrusted DDR4 RAM for a bargain price at Ebay UK
    We've already covered a few deals using Ebay's current 15% off code, but there are so many items covered by this promotion that we're drawing from the well once more. This time, we found some good deals on brand new DDR4 RAM, offering you either a dual-channel 2x8GB kit or a single 16GB stick for under £60. To get these discounted prices, use code BANK15 at the checkout. Read more  ( 17 min )
    QuakeCon returns today as a digital-only event, here are some highlights
    This year’s QuakeCon begins today, and it’s once again being staged as a digital-only event. The organisers say they’re committed to being an in-person event again in 2023 but for now there’s still some intriguing streams to tune into starting from 6pm BST/7pm CEST/10am PST. Read on for more info and our personal highlights on what’s happening at QuakeCon 2022. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Vampire Survivors’ latest patch crowns new character Queen Sigma today
    Earlier this month, arcade roguelike Vampire Survivors added a cheat menu of ‘spells’ in its Not One patch. They’re going not-one better with the 0.11.100 patch today, christened The All-In-One, by adding in more cheats, a new character and two more weapons. Witness the arrival of Queen Sigma in the fancy trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Electronic Wireless Show episode 198: the best last stands in games
    Today's topic for The Electronic Wireless Show podcast comes from listener Alastair Fakelastname, who suggested we talk about some of our favourite brave last stands in video game history. We do discuss what constitutes a last stand for the purposes of our discussion, but not until quite some time into the podcast. Many things are thrown into the ring, from RTS classics to famous boxart. Read more  ( 16 min )
    A Janet Jackson song had an uncanny power to crash laptops
    I have a new favourite bug: Janet Jackson's 1989 certified choon Rhythm Nation had an uncanny ability to crash certain old laptops. This was nothing to do with the file itself; even being near another laptop playing the song could cause a crash. Turns out, one of the sonic frequencies in Rhythm Nation coincided with the natural resonant frequencies of a particular laptop hard drive, making it crash. Amazing. Perfect. A perfect bug. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Ludum Dare creator's clocklike open-world RPG goes into early access in autumn
    Side quests sure are fun, aren’t they? Newly announced indie open-world RPG All Hail Temos eschews a main story to double-down on those distracting tangents, in a fantasy world not too dissimilar from games in Bethesda’s The Elder Scrolls series such as perennial favourite Skyrim. Delve into the blocky fantasy realm by watching the teaser trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Amazing new Doom mod replaces enemy sprites with voxel models
    I often grumble about remasters and 'HD texture packs' making classic games look worse than the original (heck, I don't even play Quake with newfangled texture filtering). And yet, I am delighted by a new Doom mod which replaces all the sprites for enemies and items with new 3D forms. The secret is voxels, carefully recreating those old 2D sprites in 3D pixels. It's pretty great, in a 'makes the game actually look the way I had remembered it' sort of way. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Hand Of Fate devs’ new tactics game is XCOM with superheroes
    If you were fond of roguelike deck-building RPG Hand Of Fate and its sequel then you might be interested in the newly revealed superhero tactics RPG Capes. It’s in development at Spitfire Interactive, a freshly founded studio made up of former Hand Of Fate devs. None of the characters in the trailer seem to be wearing their blankets around their shoulders, but it’s worth a watch all the same. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Dead Island 2 leaks after Amazon listings reveal new details and 2023 release date
    Just like the zombies that’ll presumably shamble around in it, Dead Island 2 keeps clinging on to life. Newly posted product listings for the console versions on Amazon US have shed some dying light – sorry – on the eternally-in-development horror game, first announced eight years ago at E3 2014. Here’s that infamous trailer once again, just for old times sake. Read more  ( 17 min )
    The DioField Chronicle is shaping up to be real-time Fire Emblem meets Final Fantasy
    Square Enix have made a vast array of RPGs over the years, but rarely have they ventured into the realm tactics and strategy games. A couple of big names come to mind, the obvious one being Final Fantasy Tactics, Tactics Ogre if you count their PSP remake of Quest's SNES original, and most recently, Triangle Strategy on the Switch. Outside of that, though, it's all a bit barren, which is why the real-time tactical sword-swinging of their upcoming strategy RPG The DioField Chronicle is such an interesting landgrab for them. To say they're pushing into new territory would be an understatement. Happily, judging by the sizable first chapter of the game (currently available to play for free on Steam until the game's release on September 22nd), it's clear that Square Enix and their development partners at Lancarse have a lot of smart decisions here. With its focus on individual hero characters instead of nameless military units, mixed in with the magical pizazz and flashy summons of its Final Fantasy games, The DioField Chronicle could just be the Fire Emblem-shaped hole PC players have been looking for. Read more  ( 21 min )
    Embracer Group buy the whole of Middle-Earth, plus seven more games companies
    It’s a running gag that Swedish conglomerate Embracer Group regularly buy up large chunks of the games industry, but now they’ve only gone and bought a whole universe. Embracer have acquired the rights to J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord Of The Rings and The Hobbit properties from long-time owner The Saul Zaentz Company. That includes games, along with movies and other media content, folks. Ol’ Embracer have also acquired seven companies within the gaming realm. Read more  ( 17 min )
  • Open

    Former Hand of Fate devs unveil "gritty" turn-based superhero RPG Capes
    Spitfire Interactive, a new studio established by key members of the team that worked on acclaimed deck-building dungeon-crawler Hand of Fate, has unveiled Capes, a "gritty" new turn-based superhero RPG coming to Steam next year. Capes takes place in a world where, during the Golden Age of superheroes, the villains finally managed to get the upperhand, completely wiping out humanity's protectors. Two decades on, however, in a dystopian city where superpowers are outlawed, a new generation of superheroes begins to rise with the goal of finally ending the reign of evil once and for all. In gameplay terms, that action manifests as turn-based tactical battles where players deploy their super-powered units around the map, either travelling on-foot or via teleportation, to fight goons and supervillains, and rescue reluctant citizens. Read more  ( 15 min )
    PowerWash Simulator players can now help gaming and mental health research while they spray
    PowerWash Simulator developer FuturLab has launched a new initiative that'll enable players to opt-in and help independent researchers from Oxford University's Internet Institute gather data for its research on gaming and mental health. From today, Steam players that select the 'research-edition – Research Edition 2022' drop-down option under PowerWash Simulator's Properties > Betas menu will gain access to what FuturLab calls a "one-of-a-kind anonymous research study centred around the well-being of PowerWash Simulator’s players [that] also aims to deliver insights into the larger discourse of gaming and mental health." FuturLab says two types of anonymous, de-identified data will be collected from players that opt-in to the PowerWash Simulator's Research Edition: 'base telemetry', which includes player progress and other general gameplay activities that'll be provided to the researchers for analysis, plus a second type made up of responses given directly to researchers by players. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Quake 4, Wolfenstein 3D, and more join PC Game Pass as QuakeCon begins
    QuakeCon returns today as another digital-only event, and Microsoft is getting the celebrations started a little early with the announcement that a fresh batch of Bethesda and id Software titles - including Quake 4 and Wolfenstein 3D - have now joined Game Pass for PC. Additionally, a couple of games are currently free on the Microsoft Store. Starting with Xbox Game Pass on PC, five new titles have joined the line-up as of today. Alongside Quake 4 and Wolfenstein 3D, today sees the arrival of Return to Castle Wolfenstein, An Elder Scrolls Legend: Battlespire, and The Elder Scrolls Adventures: Redguard. Additionally, subscribers can unlock all champions in Quake Champions via a special Game Pass Perk. And on the subject of Quake Champions, it's currently available free on the Microsoft Store, alongside two more QuakeCon freebies - The Elder Scrolls: Arena and The Elder Scrolls: Daggerfall. Also on the Microsoft Store, Heretic: Serpent Riders, Hexen: Beyond Heretic, and Hexen: Deathkings are now available for sale. Read more  ( 15 min )
    What does Embracer's Lord of the Rings buyout mean for Middle-earth games?
    This week on the Eurogamer Newscast, we're talking The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit and Middle-earth in general - as the rights to Tolkien's world are gobbled up by game publisher Embracer. It's another huge get for the Swedish conglomerate, which owns an increasingly enormous share of the video games industry. It also means Embracer will soon be in charge of the Middle-earth film and TV rights - and it's already talking about a fresh set of spin-offs and sequels. But what does this mean for Lord of the Rings video games? Will Embracer put some/many of its 100+ studios to work on Middle-earth projects? And what kinds of games would we like to see - and by whom? Tom Phillips, Victoria Kennedy, Ishraq Subhan and Liv Ngan discuss. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Doom 64 is currently free on Epic Games Store
    You can currently get your hands on Doom 64 for free through the Epic Games Store. You could say this is one hell of a saving. Rumbleverse - Boom Boxer Content Pack is also up for grabs as a freebie at this time. These deals are both available until 25th August. After that, Ring of Pain will make its entry. Read more  ( 15 min )
    MultiVersus players with mods can't boot the game
    MultiVersus players using mods are reportedly unable to launch the game following the most recent patch. PC players were using mods to add unofficial characters to the roster. But it appears Warner Bros is not pleased with the growing modding scene, having issued takedown notices for videos featuring mods in the game. Now it appears the game is up, with Warner Bros adding security features to stop the game running at all with mods. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Marvel's Spider-Man: the PC port plays beautifully on Steam Deck
    We described Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered on PC as a patch or two away from perfection and our opinion hasn't changed! In our initial embargo day impressions piece, we also talked about how well the game runs on Steam Deck - and today we're going to go a little deeper, pushing the Valve handheld to its limits in terms of matching the PS4 and PS5 versions - and why we ultimately ended up dropping back settings for a more optimal experience. Our final optimised settings for the Deck were also deployed on the new AyaNeo Air - a smaller, more compact PC handheld with an OLED display. It hasn't got the raw horsepower of the Deck, but somehow it's still capable of a perfectly reasonable Spider-Man experience. First things first - we've got to tackle the hot potato that is the 30fps cap we reco…  ( 21 min )
    Elden Ring sales surpass 16.6m worldwide
    Elden Ring is continuing its strong reign. The latest figures from publisher Bandai Namco reveal that the fantasy epic has now topped 16.6m sales worldwide (thanks, Gematsu). This figure includes both digital and physical copies of the game. In May, Elden Ring had sold 13.4m copies since its launch towards the start of the year. This means that, in just three months, another 3.2m units have been shifted. To borrow from Ed, Elden Ring is clearly doing GRReat! Read more  ( 15 min )
    Warzone is making Modern Warfare unplayable for some on PS5
    Some PlayStation 5 owners are reportedly struggling to play 2019's Call of Duty Modern Warfare reboot on their consoles. When attempting access any of the three components of the game - Campaign, Multiplayer and Spec Ops - players are greeted with a message stating that the required data packs are not installed. That's when the problems start. When players follow through the prompts to download the data packs, they are confronted with a message stating that their installation was "suspended." There's no other suggestion as to what's causing this. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Shin Chan: Me and the Professor on Summer Vacation - The Endless Seven-Day Journey review - the best kind of doing nothing
    I've been watching the genuinely still very good Phineas and Ferb for the first time in over a decade recently, a show that is essentially about doing absolutely everything you can on summer vacation. The absurdity of it is wonderful, but if we reduce it to just 'doing a LOT while it's summer,' it's not that relatable to me. Which is why it's slightly ironic that I've been playing Shin Chan: Me and the Professor on Summer Vacation, a game where you do almost nothing, something I find reflects me much better. And it lets you do nothing in the most soothing ways possible. Before I go into why a game where you don't do much is somehow a good thing, we need some important context. Shin Chan might be familiar to you if you, like me, watched it on Cartoon Network as a kid, but the Summer Vacation series is one you're less likely to be familiar with. Boku no Natsuyasumi (or My Summer Vacation) originally appeared on the first PlayStation in 2000, but unfortunately was never released in English. It was made by developer Millenium Kitchen, who also made Shin Chan: Me and the Professor, and is quite simply a game about a young boy exploring a countryside village. You collect bugs, bottle caps, and meet the locals, and not much else. And while I've not had the opportunity to play the game due to the language barrier, it looks like exactly my shit. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Nintendo to shrink Switch boxes to boost shipment sizes
    Nintendo will lose up to 20 percent from its Switch console boxes in order to squeeze more units into each shipment. A new report by Nikkei states the change will help Nintendo shift greater stock volumes more quickly, and also for less money. Vooks, which translated the report, calculated that Nintendo had already shrunk the Switch's box by around 14 percent for its more recent Switch OLED version. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Embracer confirms AAA project has switched studios, following report of KOTOR trouble
    Earlier in the year, a report stated the Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic remake was "in serious trouble". So much trouble, in fact, the remake was said to be "delayed indefinitely". Following on from this, Embracer - parent company of developer Aspyr - has revealed that one of its AAA projects has transitioned to another studio within the group. While which project this is was not named in the company's Q1 interim report, informed speculation points to this being the troubled KOTOR remake. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Just Cause developer spent two years on cancelled Iron Man game
    Just Cause developer Avalanche Studios was working on an Iron Man game for two years before the project was cancelled. In an interview with MinnMax, Avalanche Studios co-founder Christofer Sundberg said that the developer was approached by Disney and Marvel in 2012 and began work on the game that year. However, things quickly went awry. According to Sundberg, Disney had shortened the development time by one year, which increased the development budget since the studio would need to hire 70-80 people to finish the game in time. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Anti-Pride Spider-Man Remastered mod removed
    A mod which replaced the Pride flags with USA flags in Spider-Man Remastered has been removed from mod websites. The modding community for Spider-Man Remastered has been pretty active since the game's release on PC last week, creating mods to change the pigeons into rats and all sorts of other fun character switches. However, one mod which caught attention has been more divisive. The mod in question replaced any Pride flags that appeared in the game with the US flag. Uploaded on 15th August to Nexus Mods, it was removed by site staff on 17th August. A similar mod appeared on ModDB, which has also been removed. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Activision's Crash Bandicoot developer teasing new project
    Toys for Bob, the Activision-owned development studio behind its Skylanders series, is teasing a new project. In recent years, Toys for Bob has found fresh fame developing the Crash Bandicoot N.Sane Trilogy and Spyro Reignited Trilogy, before tackling the well-received Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time. Since then - like virtually every other Activision studio - Toys for Bob has been assisting on Call of Duty development, specifically on Warzone. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Dead Island 2 story details, release date and screenshots leak
    A set of images from Dead Island 2, and the game's apparent release date, have leaked online. A new listing (which has since seen key details removed) was spotted on Amazon last night, with the release date stated to be 3rd February, 2023. As shared by Wario64, the listing also included story details about the upcoming game. It will reportedly take place in Los Angeles, "from the verdant suburbia of Beverly Hills to the quirky promenade of Venice Beach". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Sea of Thieves - a few big buts in an ocean of booty
    If you ever want to give yourself a mild existential crisis, take a glance at the stats for your favourite game. It turns out I've spent a solid 40 days of my life sailing the Sea of Thieves since its launch back in 2018 (I’ll admit to that being considerably less than I was expecting), which might go someway to explaining why, four and a half years on, its vast oceanic expanse feels like a second home. Given how much of a sucker I am for a swashbuckling pirate yarn, there was a certain inevitability to my love affair with Sea of Thieves, but pretending it was a foregone conclusion would do a huge disservice to developer Rare's astonishing work imbuing its game with such distinctive charms. Even at launch - when, for all its fancy pirate dressing, its endless roiling oceans and multitude of beautifully wrought islands, it was, at heart, a pretty simple game of tug of war - there was a special kind of magic to Sea of Thieves that made it so much more than its component parts. Its core loop was, and to a certain extent still remains, a simple one, where every treasure gained was treasure waiting to be stolen, and every treasure stolen was treasure waiting to be retrieved. But its power was in the peripheral details, where every journey existed on the thrilling edge of chaos as its emergent additions - the pervasive threat of other players, a passing storm, a kraken attack, or perhaps even all three - coalesced around its functional core to create always unpredictable yarns. Read more  ( 23 min )
    Embracer Group acquiring rights to Lord of the Rings and Hobbit IP, plus more
    Embracer Group is to buy Middle-earth Enterprises, which will give the Swedish conglomerate the rights to JRR Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit. In a press release, Embracer discussed its process of buying Middle-earth Enterprises, although it did not disclose the sum of this deal, citing "commercial reasons" for this decision. This deal will mean that Embracer will own the rights to motion pictures, video games, board games, merchandising, theme parks and stage productions relating to Tolkein's works. Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    Googlers demand abortion searches ‘never be saved or treated as a crime’
    Staff remind CEO 'don't be evil' and treat workers equally Hundreds of Googlers this week demanded CEO Sundar Piachi do a better job protecting people seeking abortions by refusing to hand over to law enforcement any customer data that could be used to build a criminal case, and extending the health benefits full-time employees enjoy to contract workers.…  ( 6 min )
    DIY 5G specialist FreedomFi acquired by Nova Labs
    Aiming to make Helium the standard for decentralized networks DIY 5G network outfit FreedomFi has been bought by Nova Labs, the founding team behind the Helium Network.…  ( 5 min )
    Tesla expands Powerwall-to-grid program to cover most of California
    Utility companies are offering $2 per kWh for power stored in battery tech More Tesla Powerwall owners in California are getting the option to help fight blackouts – and get paid for it – as thecompany expands its virtual power plant (VPP) program to new areas of the Golden State. …  ( 5 min )
    Microsoft brings more Arm64 support and an updated expiry date to Dev Channel Windows
    Best before September 15, 2023 Microsoft has demonstrated that it really does care about Windows on Arm with a new Dev Channel build for Windows that brings native Arm64 support to its camera app as a low-impact start.…  ( 5 min )
    China, US relations further soured by CHIPS Act
    Beijing says legislation designed to interfere with its own efforts to build homegrown semiconductor industry China has reacted negatively to the passing of the US CHIPS Act, saying that the program is anti-competitive and aims to block the Middle Kingdom's efforts to build up its own semiconductor industry.…  ( 5 min )
    Google blocks third record-breaking DDoS attack in as many months
    46 million requests per second network flood comes as attacks increase by more than 200% compared to last year Google says it has blocked the largest ever HTTPS-based distributed-denial-of-service (DDoS) attack in June, which peaked at 46 million requests per second.…  ( 6 min )
    Quantum computing startup IonQ lands on Microsoft's Azure
    Yep, that’s the same company a short-seller is alleging is a ‘useless toy’ Quantum computing startup IonQ now has a second system available on Microsoft's Azure Quantum cloud platform, claiming it will open quantum systems to a wider audience.…  ( 5 min )
    Google Workspace Individual arrives in Europe
    It's taken Mountain View a year to refine the service for the Continent It has taken just over a year, but Google has finally made its Google Workspace Individual product available to European customers.…  ( 4 min )
    Tech analyst Forrester finds enterprise software is recession-proof
    As mission-critical nature of software supports prices, users also find reason to invest Despite inflation hitting a 40-year high and expected recessions, growth in enterprise software spending is expected to plow on at a steady 12 percent, according to figures from Forrester.…  ( 5 min )
    The CHIPS Act won't end US reliance on foreign foundries
    For all the billions poured in, is a 'Made in America' sticker worth it? Analysis  With all the fanfare and foundry expansions around the signing of the $280 billion CHIPS and Science Act, you'd be forgiven for thinking that the semiconductor shortage will soon be over, and the US will emerge as a silicon powerhouse rivaling that of Taiwan's TSMC and South Korea's Samsung and SK Hynix.…  ( 6 min )
    AI chip adds artificial neurons to resistive RAM for use in wearables, drones
    'Even on a small coin battery, it could run for more than 10 years' claims researcher A newly published research paper describes a compute-in-memory (CIM) chip that combines artificial neurons with resistive RAM (RRAM) so that the AI model weights can be stored and processed on the same chip.…  ( 8 min )
    South Korea cracks down on unlicensed foreign crypto businesses
    Financial Services Commission also creates a digital assets task force South Korea's Financial Intelligence Unit (KoFIU) said on Thursday it has identified 16 foreign crypto businesses it will investigate for operating unregistered.…  ( 4 min )
    Skyrora fires up second stage of XL rocket
    First stage hot fire and launch from UK soil in 2023 Brit rocketeers Skyrora have perched a second stage of its orbital class Skyrora XL atop a stack of containers and performed a successful static fire test of the engine.…  ( 4 min )
    Cloudera launches SaaS platform for the lakehouse crowd
    And it IS a crowd – marketplace is busy. Customers get choice of analytics engine and storage layer in open approach Former Hadoop stalwart Cloudera has announced a fully managed software as a service (SaaS) version of its data platform which it claims is more open than rivals in the over-crowded market.…  ( 5 min )
    Google teaches robots to serve humans – with large language models the key
    Is this it? The robo-butler dream is coming true? Video  Google's largest AI language model is helping robots be more flexible in understanding and interpreting human commands, according to the web giant's latest research.…  ( 5 min )
    We tested all the Ubuntu remixes for resource usage so you don't have to
    Which flavors are the lightest and the heaviest disk and memory-wise? The Reg FOSS desk has lined up the official Ubuntu remixes to see which ones hog the most or least of your computer's resources.…  ( 11 min )
    NASA has MOXIE, but rivals reckon they can do better for oxygen on Mars
    Food and fuels, too? Totally not sounding like a Star Trek replicator Last year, NASA produced oxygen on Mars. Now, scientists experimenting here on Earth may have found a much more efficient method of doing so for future missions. The resulting equipment could be used to produce the necessary materials for human colonization, too.…  ( 5 min )
    Microsoft to drop price for Teams Rooms, add free Basic tier for SMBs
    Hardware still required – plus tolerance for visiting the office and remote collaboration Microsoft has advised its partner community that it will soon drop the price it charges for Teams Rooms, and add a version of the product aimed at small business.…  ( 5 min )
    Ransomware attack on UK water company clouded by confusion
    Clop gang thought it hit Thames Water – but real victim was elsewhere A water company in the drought-hit UK was recently compromised by a ransomware gang, though initially it was unclear exactly which water company was the victim.…  ( 6 min )
    Deluge of of entries to Spamhaus blocklists includes 'various household names'
    Nastymail tracking service blames sloppy sending practices for swelling lists of dangerous mailers Spam-tracking service Spamhaus reported Tuesday that some of the world's biggest brands are getting loose with their email practices, causing its spam blocklists (SBL) to swell significantly.…  ( 4 min )
    Janet Jackson music video declared a cybersecurity vulnerability and assigned a CVE
    Another reason not to play 1989’s ‘Rhythm Nation’ – it messes with hard disk drives The music video for Janet Jackson’s 1989 song “Rhythm Nation” has been recognised as a cybersecurity vulnerability after Microsoft reported it can crash old laptop computers.…  ( 5 min )
    Two thirds of DNS queries for IPv6 hosts sent to Chinese resolvers fail, researchers find
    Network boffins can't say why, suggest not using the worst providers China's DNS resolvers fail two thirds of the time when handling queries for IPv6 addresses, and botch one in eight queries for IPv4, according to a group of Chinese academics.…  ( 4 min )
    That was fast: MetaGuard emerges as an 'incognito mode' for the metaverse
    As if the VR giants will let that stand – worth a try, though Imagine for a moment that you wanted to spend time in what Meta solipsistically calls the metaverse, a keiretsu of interactive cartoon panoramas powered by commercial surveillance and payment persuasion.…  ( 8 min )
    Google, Apple squash exploitable browser bugs
    Chrome flaw has public exploit, WebKit hole actively abused along with kernel escalation Google has issued 11 security fixes for desktop Chrome, including one bug that has an exploit for it out in the wild.…  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    GCC & LLVM Ready With x86 __bf16 Type Support
    Following optional "__bf16" support being added to the x86-64 psABI as a special type for representing 16-bit Brain Floating Point Format for deep learning / machine learning applications, the GCC and LLVM compilers have now landed their __bf16 type support...  ( 5 min )
    Linux Update Acknowledges Your Old Intel CPUs Might Be Vulnerable To MMIO Stale Data
    Made public back in June by Intel was the MMIO Stale Data vulnerabilities. The disclosure noted affected Intel products range from Haswell up through Rocket Lake on the client side or Xeon Scalable Ice Lake servers. However, pre-Haswell Intel CPUs might be impacted too while the Linux kernel to this point was incorrectly stating older CPUs are "not affected" by MMIO Stale Data...  ( 5 min )
    Qt Group Expanding Beyond Just The Toolkit Into More QA Software With New Acquisition
    While the Qt Group (most recently known as The Qt Company) is known for its Qt toolkit and related Qt Creator integrated development environment, Qt Design Studio, and related software centered around their cross-platform toolkit, they have acquired German software maker Axivion GmbH as they expand their product portfolio beyond just Qt...  ( 5 min )
    Intel Xeon Platinum 8380: 2021 vs. 2022 Performance For Ubuntu, Clear Linux, CentOS Stream
    With Intel Xeon Sapphire Rapids expected to make more of a splash coming up, it's a good time to revisit the Intel Xeon Platinum 8380 "Ice Lake" performance to see how the Linux software performance has evolved since last year's launch. In this article are benchmarks of the dual Xeon Platinum 8380 server from May 2021 with CentOS Stream, Clear Linux, and Ubuntu compared to fresh installs now of those latest Linux distribution releases.
    LibreOffice 7.4 Released With Support For WebP, Many Other Improvements
    LibreOffice 7.4 is out today as the latest major update to this open-source, cross-platform office suite. This leading free software office suite now supports WebP images as well as a variety of other improvements to its various components...
    LLVM Compiler Finally Gets A Tuned Scheduler Model For Intel Alder Lake P
    While Intel is normally fast at contributing improvements for new hardware to the open-source GCC and LLVM/Clang compilers, just today and ahead of the approaching Raptor Lake launch has a proper scheduler model finally been added for existing Alder Lake P processors...  ( 5 min )
    AMDVLK 2022.Q3.3 Brings Some Performance Tuning For Linux Gamers
    AMD has published their latest routine snapshot of AMDVLK, their official open-source Radeon Vulkan driver for Linux systems that is derived from their internal cross-platform Vulkan driver sources and is an alternative to the unofficial but popular Mesa Radeon Vulkan "RADV" driver...  ( 5 min )
    High Performance Mold Linker Begins Adding macOS, CMake Build Support
    Last year marked the release of Mold 1.0 as a modern, high-speed linker alternative to the likes of GNU Gold and LLVM LLD. Mold was started by Rui Ueyama who previously worked on the LLVM linker. Mold has continued seeing new features added and out today is version 1.4.1 where "alpha" support for macOS is added and also beginning to work on CMake build system integration...  ( 4 min )
    Krita 5.1 Released With JPEG-XL Support, XSIMD For Better Paint Performance
    Krita 5.1 is out today as the newest evolutionary update to this leading open-source, cross-platform digital painting program...  ( 4 min )
    MGLRU Patches Picked Up By Andrew Morton's "mm-unstable" Branch Ahead Of Linux 6.1
    Multi-Gen LRU "MGLRU" is one of the most exciting low-level kernel innovations in recent time and is already used by Google's Chrome OS and Android as well as having proven itself in various other downstream kernel builds. MGLRU is planned for upstreaming in Linux 6.1 and in preparation for that, Andrew Morton has now queued those patches into his "mm-unstable" branch for further vetting...  ( 5 min )
    NTFS3 File-System Driver Sees Late Refactoring For Linux 6.0
    NTFS3 as the modern Linux kernel read/write file-system driver for NTFS that was open-sourced by Paragon Software is seeing some late code refactoring and fixes for Linux 6.0...  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Utskällda Warcraft 3: Reforged har fått rankat läge
    Ny patch ute.  ( 6 min )
    Elden Ring har nu sålts i 16,6 miljoner exemplar
    Sköldpaddspåven gillar't.  ( 6 min )
    Quakecon börjar klockan 19 i dag
    Massa Bethesda-spel i heldigitalt, streamat event.  ( 6 min )
    Spana in en vacker videogenomgång av kommande A Plague Tale: Requiem
    Uppföljaren till den omtyckta AA-titeln från Asobo Studio.  ( 6 min )
    Dead Island 2 har dykt upp på Amazon, med potentiellt släppdatum
    Och fyra nya skärmdumpar såväl som en beskrivning.  ( 6 min )
    A Plague Tale: Requiem - ny trailer ger en översikt
    No content preview  ( 6 min )
    Se teaser för Dying Light 2:s försenade dlc, Bloody Ties
    Stort avslöjande på tisdag nästa vecka.  ( 6 min )
    Cult of the Lamb
    Att predika och ge blodsoffer till gudarna - vem hade kunnat ana att det skulle vara så här kul?  ( 9 min )
    Tomas Brolin blir Fifa 23-superhjälte när EA och Marvel slår sina påsar ihop
    Skurkar - frukta Tornadon from Näsviken!  ( 6 min )
    Quiz – Känner du igen de klassiska peka och klicka-äventyren?
    I veckans quiz får dina äventyrsgener bekänna färg.  ( 6 min )
    Tolkien får svensk ägare? Embracer vill köpa Lord of the Rings och The Hobbit
    Köper även Tripwire, Tuxedo Labs med flera. Och släpper kvartalsrapport. Puh!  ( 7 min )
    Just Cause-utvecklarna jobbade en gång i tiden på ett Iron Man-spel
    Men företagspolitik satte käppar i hjulet.  ( 6 min )
    Släppdatum för New Tales from the Borderlands kan ha avslöjats på Amazon
    Såväl som spelets omslag och beskrivning.  ( 6 min )
    Strålande vackra Planet of Lana försenas till nästa år
    Och bekräftas även till Game Pass.  ( 6 min )
    Ghostbusters: Spirits Unleashed har fått släppdatum i höst
    18 oktober försöker vi vinna som spöke eller spökjägare.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Get a couple treats in the new Linux & Thrills bundle on Steam
    Hanoi Studios have today put up their second multi-developer bundle on Steam, with a primary focus on highlighting studios that support Linux.  ( 4 min )
    Covert Critter is basically Metal Gear Solid with lizards
    Sneaking out at some point, Covert Critter is an upcoming stealth action game that will have Native Linux support. It's also pretty much Metal Gear Solid with animals.  ( 4 min )
    There's a new bundle with some Paradox Interactive titles
    The weekend is coming closer and you want some new games? Check out the small Paradox Interactive bundle from Humble Bundle with a few of what they've published.  ( 3 min )
    Embracer Group to swallow up Tripwire, Tuxedo Labs, The Lord of the Rings
    Embracer Group are quite terrifying. The amount of power they have in the gaming industry is simply insane and now they're swallowing up more studios and even the full rights to The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.  ( 4 min )
    SteamOS 3.4 Beta to update the Arch Linux base, new Steam Deck updates out now
    Valve has announced three things recently including multiple updates that are out now for the Steam Deck, plus a quick tease of what's to come for a Beta of SteamOS 3.4.  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    New Tales from the Borderlands coming in October, according to Amazon
    New Tales from the Borderlands is set to be released October 21, according to a listing on Amazon. The listing has since been removed, but luckily the internet is faster than a speeding finger hitting delete, and Gematsu was able to grab all the details. For starters, there will be a pre-order incentive called the Adventure Capital Pack that comes with cosmetics for the characters Anu, Octavio, and Fran, It also comes with 10,000 in-game currency as well as an FL4K Vaultlander collectible for use in-game. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Marvel's Spider-Man PC update brings improvements to DLSS, ray tracing
    Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered was released last Friday, and Insomniac Games and Nixxes Software have released a first small patch with multiple fixes and improvements. According to the developers, the teams are working on the next patch that will be more substantial and consists of bug fixes, improvements, and additional features, based on the feedback received. This patch fixes various ray-tracing-related crashes, improves Windows version check to prevent false positives, makes visual improvements to HBAO+, and fixes the issue where ray-traced reflections in stainless steel were rendered distorted. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Midnight Fight Express review: the superb Game Pass brawler that taps into your inner John Wick
    Brawlers haven’t seen as much moving and shaking as other genres in recent years. They seem to be mostly stuck in a phase of trying to recreate and perfect what came before, and not so much push things forward. Punching, kicking, and grappling are easy to enjoy in most of them – but few really feel like they came out in our modern era, and fewer yet want you to be the star of your action movie quite like Midnight Fight Express. I’ve had my eye on Midnight Fight Express since before it even had an official title. Back in the beginning, solo developer Jacob Dzwinel would share brief GIFs of cool stunts and beat-downs, and everyone would lose their minds. I remained skeptical; many games look sharp in carefully-edited trailers, and anyone good enough at a game’s combat can produce gold. Read more  ( 22 min )
    To celebrate QuakeCon 2022 10 games from id Software and Bethesda are coming to PC Game Pass
    QuakeCon 2022 kicks off today, and to celebrate, id Software and Bethesda PC Classics are coming to PC Game Pass. You can expect more than 10 PC games covering FPS and RPG titles as well as a sale on select titles. Coming today with PC Game Pass are Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Quake 4, Wolfenstein 3D, An Elder Scrolls Legend: Battlespire, and The Elder Scrolls Adventures: Redguard. You can also unlock all Champions in Quake Champions via a Game Pass Perk. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Elden Ring sales top 16.6 million copies worldwide
    Bandai Namco has released its consolidated financial results for the first quarter of the fiscal year ending March 31, 2023, and the report notes a rather high number of Elden Ring sales. According to the results, the FromSoftware title has sold over 16.6 million digital and physical units combined worldwide (via Gamebiz and Gematsu). The figure is quite a jump from May when the company reported 13.4 million units were sold within the first month of availability. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Pingu meets Elden Ring thanks to this fan-made Unity project
    Remember Pingu? The kids claymation program that was on TV years ago, where the lovable penguin Pingu went out his daily life eating fish and getting yelled at by his dad? Thanks to the work of one Unity developer - Adrian Mendez - Pingu has found a new home far from the arctic as a boss in an Elden Ring inspired project uploaded to the creator’s channels for the world to see. In the short video (embedded below) you can see a gargantuan Pingu break through the earth draped in red light. With a deep “Noot noot” he quickly raises a flipper and slaps the player character to death in a single strike in a scene eerily familiar to those with some time invested into Elden Ring. Tragically, this is not a mod we can experience for ourselves. Instead, Mendez built the scene from the group up in Unity, writing in the description of the video: “This is not a game, just a little project. Sometimes I'm bored…” As for the inspiration for this short but sweet vid, Adrian points to a music mix titled ‘Pingu: NOOT NOOT Theme Song but it's DARK SOULS BOSS MUSIC’ which alters Mozart’s Lacrimosa to better reflect a boss theme suitable for the beloved bird. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Lord of the Rings, Killing Floor and more gobbled up by Embracer Group
    Embracer Group, known for an ever-growing collection of video game studios and IP, has swallowed up even more as news that Lord of the Rings and Middle Earth has now fallen under the Embracer umbrella. This means that any new games, television shows, or other types of media that release within Tolkien’s world will do so under the giant burning eye of Embracer Group. The higher ups at Embracer Group have also shopped around and grabbed a handful of other notable video game companies, including Killing Floor developer Tripwire Interactive (who also published Chivalry 2 in 2021). The developers of Teardown — Tuxedo Labs — have also been acquired. They’ve also gone and grabbed Limited Run Games! That last one might sound familiar to those with a taste for fancy physical video game releases, as they’ve been creating limited special editions of titles for years now. All in all, it’s a big haul for Embracer, who seem to be inching closer and closer to swallowing up the entire industry every month. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Pokémon World Championships: Full schedule and Pokémon GO Twitch codes
    The Pokemon World Championships has finally returned to an in-person event in London, and all of the action throughout the weekend will be streamed live on Twitch. That isn't all that there is to be excited about either, given that there are going to be multiple Pokemon GO code giveaways during the stream too. The championships have already started, with things kicking off at 9am BST on Thursday 18 August. However, if you haven't had the time to tune in yet, don't fear; the event, and stream, will be running until Sunday, 21 August. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Dead Island 2 has a release date, according to Amazon leaks
    Dead Island 2 was initially announced all the way back in 2014 at E3, and after having been in development for quite the amount of time, it appears that the game may finally have a release date. A recent tweet from user Wario64 revealed that a brand new listing for Dead Island 2 was on Amazon, revealing a release date, platforms, and lengthy description for the game. As ever, all leaks are to be taken with a pinch of salt, and this release date could very well be a placeholder, but for now, Dead Island 2 could be arriving as soon as February 3, 2023. Read more  ( 17 min )
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    Netflix reklamabonnemang verkar sakna offline-tittande
    Kod i Netflix IOS-applikation indikerar att streamingtjänstens kommande reklamfinansierade abonnemang saknar möjlighet att ladda ner filmer och serier.  ( 5 min )
    Quiz: Medelålders mikrodatorer
    Commodore 64 firar 40 år och då passar det bra med ett quiz om gamla mikrodatorer.  ( 5 min )
    Corsairs nya SSD når hastigheter på upp till 10 GB/s
    Bolagets kommande SSD-enhet MP700 ska tack vare en ny kontrollerkrets med stöd för PCI Express 5.0 kunna nå sekventiella läshastigheter på 10 000 MB/s.  ( 6 min )
    Embracer vill ha rättigheterna till Sagan om ringen
    Svenska speljätten Embracer vill köpa upp Middle-earth Enterprises, som äger rättigheterna till Sagan om ringen och Bilbo – En hobbits äventyr.  ( 6 min )
    Krönika: Commodore 64 fyller 40 år
    Commodore 64 firar 40 år. Har någon annan dator betytt så mycket för framtiden? Chefredaktören delar med sig av lite nostalgi och minnen.  ( 8 min )
    Intel Arc A380 billigare än Radeon RX 6400
    Om mindre än en vecka finns Intel Arc A380 att köpa i Nordamerika, med en prislapp som stannar en bit under den jämförbara rivalen från AMD.  ( 5 min )
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  • Open

    Airbnb turns its anti-partying tech on American lodgers
    Looking to book a large house on a weekend? You'll have to jump through a few hoops Pleased with the "success" of a pilot program in Australia, Airbnb is bringing its "anti-party technology" to the US and Canada. …  ( 5 min )
    Software developer cracks Hyundai car encryption with Google search
    Top tip: Your RSA private key should not be copied from a public code tutorial A developer says he was able to run his own software on his car infotainment hardware after discovering the vehicle's manufacturer had secured its system using keys that were not only publicly known but had been lifted from programming examples.…  ( 6 min )
    After 7 years, long-term threat DarkTortilla crypter is still evolving
    .NET-based malware can push wide range of malicious payloads, and evades detection, Secureworks says A highly pervasive .NET-based crypter that has flown under the radar since about 2015 and can deliver a wide range of malicious payloads continues to evolve rapidly, with almost 10,000 code samples being uploaded to VirusTotal over a 16-month period.…  ( 6 min )
    Rocket Lab to search for signs of life in the clouds of Venus
    As promised, Peter Beck is sending a Photon next year. Because he can Rocket Lab's Peter Beck is sending a Photon spacecraft carrying a small probe to Venus, marking the culmination of a childhood ambition for the CEO.…  ( 5 min )
    Attention Microsoft-oriented Linux devs: .NET 6 is on Ubuntu 22.04
    Linux distro announces the availability of Microsoft tooling on Jammy Jellyfish Ubuntu and Microsoft have brought .NET 6 to the Ubuntu repositories, meaning that you can install it without adding any extra sources to the OS.…  ( 5 min )
    TikTok wants your trust around US midterm elections data
    Misinformation's a concern, but Chinese media giant's own data privacy practices also have people worried TikTok has joined Twitter in publishing new US midterm misinformation rules, with considerable crossover in scope and style.…  ( 5 min )
    SOFIA observatory's last hurrah set back by damage from high winds
    Boeing 747-based platform now back in California with almost a month to go before science operations end The doomed SOFIA observatory has made an earlier-than-planned return from New Zealand as the Boeing 747-based platform prepares to enter its final month of operations.…  ( 4 min )
    Cloud and datacenters start to feel the slowdown amid spiking energy costs
    While enterprises are spending more on infrastructure than ever before, what goes up must come down The datacenter industry may be starting to feel the effects of the economic slowdown, leading to further impacts on IT vendors and other suppliers, according to reports, while operators in the UK in particular are feeling the pain from rising energy costs.…  ( 5 min )
    Excel @ mentions approach general availability on the desktop
    @CEO, that macro looks sus, amirite? Microsoft's Excel is to continue its march to be the coolest software kid on the block as @ mentions move closer to general availability for the desktop version.…  ( 4 min )
    UK launches 'consultation' with EU over exclusion from science programs
    Billions in funding at stake as PM hopeful Liz Truss says bloc 'in breach of agreement' The UK government has launched formal consultations with the EU over the failure to secure its inclusion in the EU's €95.5 billion ($97.6 billion) research funding program since the island nation left the world's richest trading bloc.…  ( 5 min )
    NASA uses occult means to spot tiny moon orbiting asteroid
    Lucy probe is five years away from getting a closeup of Polymele's satellite NASA scientists working on the Lucy mission, humanity's first exploration of the "Trojan" asteroids that orbit Jupiter's Lagrange points, have found a moon around one of the asteroids the probe will visit.…  ( 5 min )
    There's no place like GNOME: Project hits 25, going on 43
    Desktop environment celebrates milestone birthday with a beta The two original developers behind the GNOME project started work 25 years ago, and the 43rd version of their brainchild is nearly here.…  ( 5 min )
    Modeling software spins up plans for floating wind turbines
    Saaaaandia, where the wind comes sweeping 'cross the sea … A novel offshore wind turbine design has been waiting for the right modeling software to come along to help make it a reality, and scientists reckon they've finally built it.…  ( 5 min )
    Mozilla finds 18 of 25 popular reproductive health apps leak data
    Scary in post-Roe America, and Poland, and far too many other places It's official: your period and/or pregnancy tracker will probably share your data with law enforcement. And they might even do it on purpose.…  ( 8 min )
    Australian court overturns 'Google is a publisher' decision
    Precedent essentially meant that search results could be considered defamatory, which is dumb Australia's High Court has overturned the 2020 decision that search results pointing to news stories make Google a publisher.…  ( 4 min )
    UK hospitals lose millions after AI startup valuation collapses
    Two trusts saw nearly $18 million go up in smoke when Sensyne Health was delisted from AIM Two NHS hospitals in the UK have lost nearly £15 million ($18 million) between them due to the collapse in value of an AI startup.…  ( 5 min )
    NASA wants a hundredfold upgrade for space computers
    Does it hope to run Doom on the Moon or something? NASA has awarded a $50 million contract to Microchip Technology, the microcontroller giant, to develop next-generation processors that will enable space computers to be 100 times faster than they currently are.…  ( 5 min )
    Russian military uses Chinese drones and bots in combat, over manufacturers' protests
    Testimonials from Russian generals not welcomed by DJI or Unitree Robotics Russia's military has praised civilian grade Chinese-made drones and robots for having performed well on the battlefield, leading their manufacturers to point out the equipment is not intended or sold for military purposes.…  ( 5 min )
    Elon Musk ‘buying Manchester United’ football club
    Results are rubbish on Earth, but Mars United could be undisputed champions Rocketry, energy, automotive, AI, tequila, tunneling and (maybe) social media entrepreneur Elon Musk has proclaimed his intention to buy Manchester United — the organization often cited as the world's most supported football club.…  ( 4 min )
    Open source VideoLAN media player asks why it's blocked in India
    Rubbishes suggestions poisoned clones or ancient malware are worthy reasons for ban Developers of the open source VideoLAN media player have started sniping at India's government over an apparent block on the project's website.…  ( 5 min )
    DARPA seeks a few good AI coders to help America find its own rare minerals
    There's some pocket change in it for you, if you can crack this nut DARPA – the US government's boffinry nerve center – is offering up to $10,000 to programmers who can whip up some AI to help find rare earth minerals on our home world and ease US supply constraints of critical materials needed by the energy and defense industry.…  ( 6 min )
    The trade ban that wasn't: US allows 94% of restricted tech exports to China anyway
    谢谢 美国! US Commerce Department can make all the noise it wants about limiting tech exports to China, but it is reportedly doing little to actual stem the flow of components and equipment.…  ( 5 min )
    RubyGems now requires multi-factor auth for top package maintainers
    Sign-on you crazy diamond RubyGems.org, the Ruby programming community's software package registry, now requires maintainers of popular "gems" to secure their accounts using multi-factor authentication (MFA).…  ( 5 min )
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    Update Chrome now to patch actively exploited zero-day
    It's the fifth Chrome zero-day patched by Google this year.  ( 4 min )
    Apple reportedly plans iPhone and Apple Watch event for September 7th
    New chips, new cameras, and the death of the iPhone mini are all possibilities.  ( 5 min )
    Today’s best deals: Amazon Fire HD tablets, Google Pixel 6 phones, and more
    Dealmaster also has the Xbox Series S, 8BitDo gamepads, and board games.  ( 9 min )
    Linking to news doesn’t make Google liable for defamation, Australia court rules
    High Court finds Google isn't a publisher, says "a hyperlink is merely a tool."  ( 6 min )
    Review: We Are OFK is stylish, subversive TV disguised as an indie game
    A modern, thoughtful update to the visual novel concept for disaffected Gen Z.  ( 6 min )
    New macOS 12.5.1 and iOS 15.6.1 updates patch “actively exploited” vulnerabilities
    Kernel and WebKit bugs can allow arbitrary code execution on Apple's devices.  ( 4 min )
    First official teaser for Wednesday is deliciously “Burtonesque”
    "The ambition of the show was to make it an eight-hour Tim Burton movie."  ( 7 min )
    CDC to restructure after COVID failure, “confusing and overwhelming” guidance
    Cultural, structural changes to shift focus from scientific publishing to public health action.  ( 5 min )
    Google might give the Pixel tablet a 64-bit-only build of Android
    64-bit-only mode promises better performance and security.  ( 5 min )
    AMD will announce Ryzen 7000 CPUs August 29. Here’s everything we know about them
    Ryzen 7000 and Zen 4 will be a big overhaul for AMD's successful Ryzen CPUs.  ( 5 min )
    No more deadly ragers at Airbnb rentals—or so the company hopes
    Pilot program reduced banned parties in Australia by 35 percent, company says.  ( 5 min )
    iOS VPNs have leaked traffic for more than 2 years, researcher claims
    VPNs on Apple mobile devices reportedly keep connections open and expose data.  ( 6 min )
    US chipmakers hit by sudden downturn after pandemic boom
    Intel, Micron set to cut capital spending despite new law aiming to boost production.  ( 5 min )
    Rimac Nevera first drive: An entirely new level of hypercar performance
    It’s more than just a showcase of the company's latest EV technology.  ( 6 min )
    Rocket Lab will self-fund a mission to search for life in the clouds of Venus
    "Breakthrough science is possible."  ( 6 min )
    Solving the rock-hard problem of nuclear waste disposal
    Finland avoided some of the mistakes made elsewhere and opened its waste repository.  ( 6 min )
    Anti-vaccine activists giddily celebrate as poliovirus spreads in NY
    Anti-vaccine org calls dip in childhood vaccination a pandemic "silver lining."  ( 6 min )
    Chrome “Feed” is tantalizing, but it’s not the return of Google Reader
    It's not that Google doesn't like RSS, it just wants RSS to look like Google.  ( 5 min )
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    Turn any Thunderbolt-equipped laptop into a gaming powerhouse with this £93 GPU enclosure
    Thunderbolt graphics card enclosures are one of the coolest bits of kit you can get, I think. Open up this metal box, put a graphics card inside, and suddenly any PC or laptop you connect to it via Thunderbolt gets a substantial upgrade in gaming prowess. These docks used to cost around £200 or £300, but recently we've started to see radically more affordable options - and today we've reached a new low-water mark. The Lenovo Legion BoostStation can handle GPUs up to 300W (think an Nvidia RTX 3070 Ti or AMD RX 6800 XT), and is available for just £93 when you use the code BANK15 to knock 15% off the price at Ebay. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Revitalise an old PC with a 480GB SSD for less than £30
    Do you still have a laptop or desktop in your life running off a hard drive? Right now you can pick up a comfortably-sized 480GB SATA SSD for less than £30, thanks to a discount code available at Ebuyer's Ebay store. Use code BANK15 to drop the price of a cheap and cheerful Adata SU630 SSD from £35 to £29.78, and marvel at the speed and responsiveness improvement you'll see on machines that were previously running on mechanical hard drives. I performed an upgrade using a similar drive on my brother's old laptop, and it breathed new life into a machine almost ten years old. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Boyfriend Dungeon celebrates its 1st anniversary with free DLC
    Dating sim dungeon-crawler Boyfriend Dungeon is marking its one-year anniversary with the free Secret Weapons update, out today. The DLC adds a fresh dungeon to delve into, along with three new weapons to romance the scabbards off. Gaze starry-eyed at the new update’s trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    One Night Stand dev's next game is a Miiverse-inspired visual novel
    The solo developer behind the excellent visual novel One Night Stand has revealed their next game project today, and it's quite possibly the perfect cross-section of all my interests. It's called Videoverse, and is described as a narrative adventure above love and friendship, inspired by Nintendo's now defunct social network, Miiverse (which all Wii U and 3DS owners know is the single, most wholesome thing to have ever existed in video games). Have a watch of the teaser trailer below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Inkbound is an upcoming turn-based roguelike from the Monster Train devs
    Developers Shiny Shoe are best known for their roguelike deckbuilder Monster Train, which Matt Cox slapped a Bestest Best badge onto in his review. And I got an early look at their upcoming game Inkbound, a co-op roguelike that ditches the usual realtime room-clearing for turn-based battling. From what I've seen, it looks like it has potential. Read more  ( 17 min )
    We Are OFK review: an emotional music biopic that’s a bit too Silicon Valley
    Luca Le Fae has had it. His work as a writer for Leviathan Games, one of the biggest game developers on the planet, may pay well, but it’s creatively unfulfilling. A fateful encounter with his old acquaintance, Jey Zhang, at a party may just provide Luca with the escape he has been looking for. Jey, a successful music producer, remembers Luca as an incredible songwriter and asks him if he has any samples he could send her. Suddenly the unthinkable, a single, an EP, perhaps even actual stardom, seems within Luca’s grasp, but life has a tendency to get in the way even when you’re ready to take the chance of a lifetime. We Are OFK can be described as a 3D visual novel or a mildly interactive five-part TV series you just happened to buy on Steam. The first two episodes are available on launch day, with episodes three to five releasing weekly after the game's initial release. Each one comes with its own opening, which really sells the feeling of catching a new episode of a miniseries each week. With each episode, you follow the story from a different band member's point of view, from their initial decision to be band-adjacent to taking their first wobbly steps in promoting themselves as artists. Joining Luca on his journey are pianist Itsumi Saito, who works in social media management at Leviathan, and Luca’s housemate Flores, an audio-visual effects artist. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Raise Legendary Pets and earn cookies in Lost Ark’s August update
    Free-to-play Korean MMO Lost Ark is getting a new update, Under The Arkesian Sun, on August 24. This update welcomes Legendary Pet status, with useful perks that can buff your max HP, and a new spot in the Stronghold called the Pet Ranch. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Vault images emerge from the set of Amazon’s Fallout TV show
    New set images have leaked from the production of Amazon’s Fallout TV show, and they appear to show the inside of Vault 32. There’s also a nice bit of propaganda that reads “The outside world can never hurt you” and shows a superheroic Vault Boy deflecting nukes with a shield. How very Fallout. Read on to take a look at some of the images below. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Spare a thought for Neon Blight, a cyberpunk Moonlighter-like that came out just after Neon White
    Heard joke once: man goes to doctor. Says he's depressed. Says life seems harsh and cruel. Says he feels all alone in a threatening world where what lies ahead is vague and uncertain. Doctor says, "Treatment is simple. Great game Neon White is out now. Go and play it. That should pick you up." Man bursts into tears. Says, "But doctor... I am Neon White. No, wait. What did you say? Did you say white or blight? Oh, white, oh, okay." Read more  ( 15 min )
    QUBE 10 years on: still a great puzzle game, and it's about to get one heck of a glow-up
    Time has never been very kind to QUBE. The first-person puzzler first began life as a university project in the late 00s, but by the time it finally launched commercially in early 2012, it was almost universally written off as nothing but an okay Portal clone. In fairness, there was a lot working against it. Like Portal, it was set in a largely white, sterile testing facility, and while it didn't involve flinging boxes through portals, each one of its puzzles did revolve around manipulating brightly coloured blocks to progress to the next room. The one major thing it was lacking, and probably a large part of why it never really stacked up to Portal at the time, was a GLaDOS-sized villain. QUBE's story would come later, in the 2014 Director's Cut, which added an entire script, voice-acting and a revamped musical score to give Toxic Games' puzzler a bit more, well, shape. Even with all those extra flourishes, though, the Director's Cut was still the same QUBE puzzles from before, leading many to write off the update yet again as a slight improvement on the original, but nothing to get too excited about. Now, in 2022, QUBE is getting a fancy 10th Anniversary Edition that rebuilds both versions of the game from the ground up, while also adding an entirely new sector that doubles the length of the game. And I'm telling you: please don't write off QUBE for the third time in its life. It deserves better than that. Read more  ( 21 min )
    Hand Of Fate devs’ new tactics game is XCOM with superheroes
    If you were ever fond of roguelike deckbuilding ARPG Hand Of Fate and its sequel then you might be interested in the newly revealed superhero tactics RPG Capes. It’s in development at Spitfire Interactive, a freshly founded studio made up of former Hand Of Fate devs. None of the characters in the trailer seem to be wearing their blankets around their shoulders, but it’s worth a watch all the same. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Tower Of Fantasy is an MMO gacha game that can't match Genshin Impact's polish
    Tower Of Fantasy is a free-to-play MMO gacha game, the sort of game that implores you to spend in-game currency on lootboxes in the hopes you'll build a particularly powerful collection of anime people. Genshin Impact wrapped this business model up in a surprisingly excellent open world RPG, that Graham called one of the best games of 2020. Tower Of Fantasy pulls from a neighbouring gacha vending machine, except that its mixture of MMO, realtime combat, and lootboxing isn't wrapped up in as consistent a package. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Valve celebrate SteamVR bug squashing with giant scans of real, perished bugs
    Valve have launched the SteamVR 1.23 update, and to mark the occasion, they’re letting you… look at high-quality scanned models of genuinely deceased insects? That they found? I guess??? Key technical improvements to SteamVR include multiple crash fixes, smoother controller animations and new extension support for the OpenXR platform; the full patch notes are on Steam. But the update also adds a new SteamVR Home setting that – and I quote, with emphasis Valve’s - "showcases CT scans of actual dead bugs we found lying on the ground outside our office." See? The Valve Index isn’t just for playing Half-Life Alyx, eh. Read more  ( 16 min )
    What's better: a level 1 rat, or Alone In The Dark's jacket inventory?
    Last time, you decided that nude mods are better than going into meats and guts. Oh sure, you're brave with your votes, but not one single commenter was brave enough to address the subject of honking their pud. Cowards. If you won't expand, we have to move on. This week, I pose a question of squeaky critters versus a squeaky coat. What's better: a level 1 rat, or Alone In The Dark's jacket inventory? Read more  ( 19 min )
    People seem to think Death Stranding is heading to PC Game Pass
    The Twitter account for Microsoft’s PC Game Pass service decided to change their profile picture, and coyly drew attention to its familiar looking mist-covered rocky backdrop with a tweet. "Sometimes we just like a good landscape picture," they said enigmatically. If you’re familiar with the Game Pass Twitter accounts, they like to do the flippant social media thing and tease followers. Well, this latest attempt has people speculating that the Sony-trademarked Death Stranding is about to hit PC Game Pass. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Fact check: Tony the Tiger’s milk-cooled PC would work, somewhat
    Tony the Tiger – the neckerchiefed mascot of Kellogg’s Frosties – is becoming a VTuber, with some kind of heavily sponsored Twitch stream scheduled for this Friday in which “he” will play “a popular battle royale game” with some other livestreamers. I’m not very interested in this, to be honest, but I am curious about the “milk-coolant PC” that Tony’s avatar will be using to get the W’s and build creepy parasocial relationships with viewers. Could such a PC, liquid-cooled by a dairy product, actually function? Read more  ( 16 min )
    MMO Tower Of Fantasy cracks down on server wait times and cheats
    Recently launched sci-fantasy gacha MMO Tower Of Fantasy is trying to tackle server queues and cheats, the developers have promised. In a message posted to the official site, Tower Of Fantasy’s devs Hotta Studio say they’ve now implemented increased server caps and improved server recommendation logic for PC. There’s also a queue timer, if you find your feet tapping while you’re waiting to join. You can watch the game’s launch trailer below if you missed it last week. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Grounded's latest test update adds a new way to share worlds
    Miniaturised survival game Grounded doesn't have dedicated servers, but the latest update offered up for public testing contains a new feature that'll help. It's called "Shared Worlds", and it allows Grounded worlds to be stored in the cloud so that anyone that world is shared with can host the game. Read more  ( 16 min )
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    Dying Light 2 teases first story DLC Bloody Ties in new trailer
    Techland has shared a brisk tease of Dying Light 2: Stay Human's long-awaited first story DLC, confirming it to be titled Bloody Ties - and hinting at its setting - in a tantalising new trailer. Bloody Ties - the first of two bits of story DLC so far confirmed to be on the way as part of Dying Light 2's five year journey of post-launch support - was originally expected to launch in June but Techland eventually delayed its release to September for additional development. Much is still unknown about what it'll bring, but we do have a few hints based on previous official teases. According to lead designer Tymon Smektała, for instance, it'll run "parallel to the main story" and will focus on "a specific place outside of the Villedor city limits". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Amazon leak says Tales from the Borderlands follow-up out this October
    A fleeting Amazon listing has provided fresh details on New Tales from the Borderlands, the (newly monikered) Gearbox-developed follow-up to Telltale Games' sublime 2014 episodic adventure of almost the same name, suggesting it'll launch for Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 4, PS5, Switch, and PC on 21st October. The original Tales from the Borderlands (simultaneously both the best Borderlands title and the best Telltale game, and I'll hear no more about it) charted the genuinely funny - and, by the time it reached its fifth-episode denouement, surprisingly touching - adventures of Hyperion employee Rhys (played by Troy Baker) and Pandoran con-artist Fiona (Laura Bailey) as they attempted to locate and open one of Borderlands' legendary Vault. With developer Telltale having shut its doors in 2018 - and given the relative commercial failure of the original game - it seemed like a sequel might never come to pass. However, Borderlands developer Gearbox surprised everyone back in April when it announced that a follow-up wasn't just in the works but would be out by the end of the year. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Blizzard details Overwatch account merging ahead of cross-progression launch
    Ahead of Overwatch 2's early access launch in October, Blizzard is giving existing Overwatch players the opportunity to begin merging their various Overwatch 1 accounts as part of its preparations for the sequel's new cross-progression feature, and it's shared an FAQ on the process so players can start the transition now. Cross-progression, which was confirmed for Overwatch 2's release https://www.eurogamer.net/overwatch-2-launches-as-a-free-to-play-early-access-title-in-october, enables Overwatch players to continue their progress, and use any acquired cosmetics, across any platform using a single account. As such, those players that currently hold multiple accounts across several systems now have the opportunity to merge them into one. As of yesterday, 16th August, all players with an Overwatch account on Xbox, PlayStation, or Switch will be prompted identify, select, and confirm which accounts they want to merge next time they log into the game. This requires linking to a Battle.net account (which is mandatory for Overwatch 2 anyway) so players will need to create one, if they haven't done so previously, to compete the process. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Boyfriend Dungeon Secret Weapons DLC out today for free
    Boyfriend Dungeon's DLC has been surprise released today, just after the game's one year anniversary. The free DLC was announced back in June but without a release date. The Secret Weapons update includes a new dungeon and new dateable weapons, including Dr. Holmes the Whip designed by CEO and creative director at Unseen Inc., Ikumi Nakamura (former director of Ghostwire Tokyo). Read more  ( 15 min )
    We Are OFK review - frothy pop music meets likeable teen drama
    The concept album has been around for decades as a way for musicians to focus their work on a central theme. But what if the concept album was actually a video game? That's what We Are OFK is attempting to achieve, though it's not the first attempt. Björk's Biophilia album from 2011 came with an interactive app, while Sayonara Wild Hearts (2019) was a music video game that lasted as long as an album and warrants repeat plays. With We Are OFK, Team OFK has created a visual novel that contextualises an EP, detailing the story of its fictional band. And the music is set to be released officially, delivered by its anime band members Gorillaz-style. As a visual novel it offers likeable teen drama with welcome representation, but as an interactive music game it disappoints. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Pokémon Center plagued by queues despite pre-booking system
    London's latest Pokémon Center pop-up shop has been plagued by queues on its opening day - mirroring the messy situation faced by fans the last time round. Advice given to fans this afternoon - even those who previously pre-booked their slot to go shopping - is reportedly to now arrive and start queuing an hour before your expected entrance timing, Eurogamer has been told. The pop-up shop is open for four more days at London's ExCeL Centre, where Pokémon's World Championships are taking place. Eurogamer's Chris Tapsell is in attendance, and described it to me as "very busy". Read more  ( 16 min )
    New Call of Duty skin appears to plagiarise former Infinity Ward employee working on Dr Disrespect game
    A new skin has been released in Call of Duty, which bears a striking resemblance to the work of former Infinity Ward employee Robert Bowling. Bowling is now studio head at Midnight Society, the developer behind the NFT-fuelled shooter Deadrop that's backed by Dr Disrespect. Art for Deadrop was revealed in July, but now a very similar looking skin called Doomsayer is available in Call of Duty Vanguard and Warzone. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Untamed Isles is a cautionary tale of game development funded by crypto investors
    Untamed Isles, a Pokémon-like MMORPG with "optional" play-to-earn elements, has been placed on indefinite hiatus. The game had been set for an Early Access release date of 6th October, which will no longer be happening. "There's been a lot going on in the last 72 hours. This has been a wild rush," is how Joshua Grant, CEO of Phat Loot Studios, opened his Twitch stream on 12th August. The stream was held to address the statement that had just been published by Phat Loot, in which Untamed Isles' hiatus was announced, and to field questions from the community. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Mario Kart 8's new Booster Course Pass tracks betray their mobile origins
    Mario Kart 8 is a stunningly successful game with over 50 million copies sold across Wii U and Switch - so it's not surprising that Nintendo has returned with a content expansion for its blockbuster kart racer. Dubbed the Booster Course Pass, this expansion includes a whopping 48 courses split over six waves of course releases, with the last drop scheduled for late 2023. So far, 16 courses have been delivered but players and press alike have complained about basic layouts and graphical downgrades. At the heart of the issue is that the bulk of these tracks have been ported from Mario Kart Tour, a mobile game with simplified graphics and gameplay. So how do these new Booster Course tracks stack up - are they a good fit or is the distance from mobile just too large? While Mario Kart 8 has se…  ( 20 min )
    Fans think The Matrix is coming to MultiVersus
    Files relating to The Matrix have been found in MultiVersus' latest update, a reliable dataminer has claimed. The Matrix's iconic green text has been spotted lurking within Multiversus' code by AisulMV, suggesting a debut for Neo and pals may be on the cards. This would be no big surprise for MultiVersus, the Smash Bros-style brawler built on the back of Warner Bros. franchises - of which The Matrix saga is but one. Read more  ( 15 min )
    EA scores own goal with FIFA 23 pricing mix up
    EA has admitted it accidentally listed its most recent FIFA release on the Epic Games Store in India for a tiny 4.80 rupees. That is roughly 5p here in the UK. But it doesn't end there. To add insult to injury, this listing wasn't simply for the standard copy of the game. It was, in fact, for the Ultimate Edition. As noted by PC Gamer, this means those who purchased this version of the game at its mislisted price got it for a discount of 99.98 percent, as EA is honouring these purchases. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Nintendo was working on platform-agnostic accessibility controller, Reggie Fils-Aimé says
    Nintendo has used the Xbox adaptive controller as a starting point for its own accessibility controller. That's according to ex-Nintendo of America boss Reggie Fils-Aimé, who hopes the company was still developing the platform-agnostic controller. Xbox's controller was used "as a jumping-off point to create something that would be platform-agnostic and adaptable by any consumer," he told Inverse. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Leaked Fallout set images give us a closer look at TV adaptation
    A series of new images for the upcoming Fallout TV adaptation from Amazon have made their way online. These images give us a good look at some of the show's set pieces, and, dare I say it, it's all looking cautiously optimistic. This first set of images was shared by a former Bethesda employee, who goes by LoneVaultWanderer on Twitter. They show the inside of the series' vault, including a nursery, Vault 32 insignia and the Vault Boy poster warning of the outside world. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Fresh report alleges sexist workplace at Nintendo of America
    A report has detailed instances of sexual harassment at Nintendo of America, and a working environment where some women - particularly contract employees without full-time employment - felt pressured into silence. The report, published by Kotaku, builds on allegations reported in the past about a divide between Nintendo's full-time and contracted staff, the latter of whom enjoy fewer perks and lack job security. Now, women who worked as contract employees have come forward to discuss some of the issues they faced in particular, such as instances of sexual harassment and unequal pay. Read more  ( 15 min )
    DualSense's haptics need to find the right balance of immersion and functionality
    When it comes to video game consoles, the current generation has one platform holder going all-in on tactile immersion — Sony Interactive Entertainment. No stranger to creating immersive experiences, players may recall Sony's PSVR and its PS Move controller, the DualShock 4 with its touchpad and motion control, heck, even the EyeToy Play. The current generation PS5 includes a DualSense controller that comes packed with features from the DualShock 4 and tacks on new adaptive triggers and haptic feedback. Sony has been fixated on marketing this unique controller for immersion: selling players on the experience of feeling their bow being drawn taut, or the tippy tapping of raindrops against their palms. When it comes to accessibility for disabled players, there's so much potential that lies in the existence of these intricate haptics. It feels, though, as if the focus on immersion may be seeing developers forget about providing a balance, or optional choice, of immersion and functionality. I'll jump straight into how the controller's haptics can be useful for accessibility — the adaptive triggers are a story for another day. I'm Deaf and I wear hearing aids, yet I still miss key sounds, or I fail to understand the newfangled 3D audio. The haptics could guide me with directionality, they could make me feel immersed in a world to set the scene, and they could highlight a successful puzzle completion. Additionally, they could help those who are blind or have low vision, by informing players of interactive elements, making menu navigation more tactile, and also warning of nearby dangers such as enemies or ledges. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Fans believe Death Stranding may soon hit PC Game Pass
    A change to the PC Game Pass Twitter profile picture has fans believing Death Stranding may be on the way. The image, behind the PC Game Pass logo, is of a rugged landscape very similar to the Icelandic-inspired hills of Death Stranding. While Kojima Production's game was published by PlayStation for console release, the PC release was published by 505 Games - the Director's Cut was released earlier this year. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 pre-orders offer eight days of campaign early access
    The powers that be at Call of Duty have announced that those who digitally preorder Modern Warfare 2 will be able to play through the game's campaign eight days before its official release. So, instead of waiting until the 28th October to flex your muscles with Captain Price and co, you will be able to get a headstart on the 20th October instead. To accompany this news, we also got a bite-size trailer for the game's campaign, which you can see below. Meanwhile, in a new post, Activision states: "This Campaign features missions in Europe, Asia, and the Americas, and is set to be an incredible experience on numerous levels: offshore sieges with underwater combat, all-out explosive assaults from 30,000 feet above enemy strongholds, and high-stakes, low-profile stealth missions in both plain sight and under the cover of darkness." Read more  ( 16 min )
    Final Fantasy series "struggling" to adapt to industry trends, says Yoshi P
    Final Fantasy 14 director and producer Naoki Yoshida has stated he believes the game series is "struggling" to adapt to industry trends and meet player expectations. Speaking to Inverse, Yoshida discussed the future of the series. "In terms of whether Final Fantasy is successfully adapting to industry trends, I believe the series is currently struggling," he said. Read more  ( 15 min )
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    Samsung Preps Next-Gen V-NAND Memory: Higher Capacity and Performance
    Samsung's 8th Generation V-NAND memory looms to production.  ( 59 min )
    Record on Quantum Entanglement at a Distance Broken, Pulling in The Timeline for a Quantum Internet
    A team of researchers from China managed to entangle two different quantum memories across a 12.5 km distance in an urban environment, bringing the promise of a quantum internet closer.  ( 60 min )
    Tesla Brags About In-House Supercomputer, Now With 7,360 A100 GPUs
    Tesla is growing its Ampere GPU powered AI supercomputer for now, but ultimately plans to replace the processing power with its own Dojo D1 ASICs forged on TSMC N7.  ( 59 min )
    Corsair Teases First PCIe 5.0 SSD With 10,000MB/s of Bandwidth
    Corsair has teased its first PCIe 5.0 SSD, showing speeds of up to 10,000MB/s. Full specs and release date weren't shared, but we expect it may launch this winter.  ( 59 min )
    NASA Awards $50 Million Contract for Next Space Computer
    A lucrative contract to make spaceflight processors has gone to Microchip Technology, Inc. of Arizona.  ( 59 min )
    Ryzen 7 7700X Zen 4 CPU Qualifying Sample Spotted Online
    A new image of a Ryzen 7000 qualifying sample has surfaced online. The image is a shot of AMD's upcoming Ryzen 7 7700X 8 core CPU.  ( 59 min )
    TSMC to Begin 3nm Chip Production Next Month
    TSMC's N3 fabrication process to enter high-volume manufacturing in September.  ( 59 min )
    US-China Tech Export Approval Rate Proof of Policy Failure, Says Ex-Pentagon Analyst
    Even technologies which could be useful to the communist party controlled military are waved through. Critics say something must change to rebalance trade vs security concerns.  ( 59 min )
    RTX 3080 Laptop Deals: All the Models You Can Buy Right Now
    We help you find RTX 3080-powered gaming laptop deals.  ( 64 min )
    Alienware's Latest Gaming Monitor Hits 360Hz, Rocks Retractable Headset Hanger
    Both the AW2523HF and AW2723DF feature a retractable headset hanger.  ( 59 min )
    Intel Launches NUC 12 Pro 'Wall Street Canyon' Mini PCs
    Intel finally unveils its business-oriented NUC 12 Pro 'Wall Street Canyon' compact PCs.  ( 59 min )
    Largest Bitcoin Miners See $1 Billion Wiped From Value
    Large Bitcoin mining companies have made large losses, but continue to take out loans and refinance.  ( 59 min )
    Raspberry Pi Pico W Doorbell Sends Telegram Alerts
    Maurício Pessoa is using a Raspberry Pi Pico W to send alerts through Telegram when his doorbell is triggered.  ( 59 min )
    Mavix M9 Chair Review: Top Tier With a Price Tag to Match
    The Mavix M9 chair costs $1,000, but you get what you pay for. It puts other gaming chairs to shame with its comfort and ergonomic adjustments.  ( 69 min )
    Loupedeck Live, Loupedeck CT, and Loupedeck+: Which Model Makes Sense For You?
    The Loupedeck Live, Loupedeck CT, and Loupedeck+ consoles are excellent, highly-customizable tools for streaming, video editing, and beat-making, but the right one for you is situation-dependent.  ( 72 min )
    Tachyum Submits Bid to Build 20 Exaflops Supercomputer
    Tachyum proposes to build a 20 exaflops supercomputer based on its Prodigy processors by 2025.  ( 60 min )
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    Spellbook Demonslayers is the most insane Vampire Survivors-like yet
    You've put 100+ hours into Vampire Survivors and now what? Spellbook Demonslayers is what and there's a free prologue available for you to try out.  ( 4 min )
    Blossom Tales 2: The Minotaur Prince out with Linux support
    Blossom Tales 2: The Minotaur Prince is a new Native Linux release from Castle Pixel and Playtonic Friends. It hasn't been Steam Deck Verified yet but works great.  ( 4 min )
    Fun games for Steam Deck that won't break the bank
    Looking for some games to play on Steam Deck that are good, work well and don't cost too much? Here's a few choice picks from me to you.  ( 4 min )
    Airships: Conquer the Skies gets co-op and direct ship control
    Airships: Conquer the Skies is a wonderful Native Linux indie game about constructing various vehicles and conquering everything you can with them.  ( 4 min )
    Steam Deck gets a Stable Client update with Offline Mode fixes
    Not long after a bunch of changes rolled out to Preview and Beta, Valve has updated the Steam Deck Client software with various improvements.  ( 5 min )
    Valve dev understandably not happy about glibc breaking Easy Anti-Cheat on Linux
    Recently it was noticed that users on more bleeding-edge Linux distributions that updated saw Easy Anti-Cheat no longer working on Linux, the culprit was glibc and now a Valve developer has spoken out about it.  ( 8 min )
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    VEIKK VK1200 Drawing Tablet With 11.6-inch 1080p Display Works On Linux For ~$169
    VEIKK is a company I previously hadn't heard of that offers a range of pen displays and drawing tablets for digital artists. At first when they reached out around reviewing one of their drawing tablets, I questioned their Linux support but it turns out their graphics tablets do work across all major platforms. I've been trying out the VEIKK VK1200 the past few weeks and it's been working out decent as a 11.6-inch drawing monitor for just $169 USD.  ( 4 min )
    Official Ubuntu RISC-V Images Released For StarFive's VisionFive Board
    Earlier this summer I wrote about Canonical working to provide good support for StarFive's VisionFive low-cost RISC-V board. That work has now culminated with an Ubuntu 22.04.1 LTS image for use on this Chinese RISC-V single board computer...  ( 5 min )
    AMD PMF Driver Queued Ahead Of Linux 6.1 Later This Year
    While Linux 6.0 won't be out for another month and a half, on deck already for Linux 6.1 is the AMD Platform Management Framework "PMF" driver being queued into platform-drivers-x86.git...  ( 5 min )
    Microsoft Xbox Adaptive Controller Support Being Worked On For Linux
    Microsoft's Xbox Adaptive Controller is intended for gamers with limited mobility and is intended as a control hub to making gaming more accessible. Linux support for the Xbox Adaptive Controller is being worked on...  ( 4 min )
    RADV Radeon Vulkan Driver Begins Landing Graphics Pipeline Library Support
    Mesa's Radeon Vulkan driver "RADV" has started seeing support land for VK_EXT_graphics_pipeline_library thanks to the work of one of Valve's Linux graphics driver developers...  ( 5 min )
    NVIDIA JetPack 5.0.2 Released With Production Support For AGX Orin
    NVIDIA this week published JetPack 5.0.2 as their updated development environment and SDK for their Arm-powered Jetson modules and developer kits...  ( 4 min )
    Linux Patch Sparks Differing Views Over External Monitor Handling With iGPU vs. dGPU
    Canonical kernel engineer Kai-Heng Feng posted a patch on Tuesday for capable laptops to switch their external monitor connections to be routed through a laptop's discrete GPU rather than the integrated GPU. With select laptops this can be done with an ACPI call but raises questions among upstream developers rather this change is indeed desirable...  ( 5 min )
    VFX & Animation Studios Urged To Upgrade To RHEL 9 Or Rocky Linux / AlmaLinux 9
    VFX Reference Platform as a standards body that aims to help standardize software platforms in the realm of digital content creation (DCC) has published a detailed report for studios to consider in choosing their next Linux platform. Their new recommendations for visual effects and animation studios about moving to newer Linux distributions over the next year -- especially with many still relying on CentOS 7 -- is for moving to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 otherwise one of the downstreams like Rocky Linux or AlmaLinux. Close behind in their recommendations and as a longer-term objective is also tossing some support behind Ubuntu Linux...  ( 6 min )
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    Souls-lika Thymesia får blandade omdömen inför släppet i morgon
    Från "överraskande bra" till "Bloodbornes korkade kusin".  ( 6 min )
    I tokmysiga Bloody Hell Hotel är du en vampyr som driver ett hotell
    Ett perfekt sätt att ha stabil tillgång till färskt blod.  ( 6 min )
    Life is Strange-remastrarna har fått släppdatum till Switch
    I september återvänder vi till Arcadia Bay.  ( 6 min )
    Inför Overwatch 2 - så länkar du spelkonton till battle.net
    Viktigt att välja rätt konto.  ( 6 min )
    1993 års Doom har äntligen fått 3d-fiender
    Mod byter 2d-sprites mot 3d-voxlar.  ( 6 min )
    Läckta foton från Fallout-tv-serien ser ut att göra spelen rättvisa
    Vault 32 har hamnat på bild.  ( 6 min )
    Blodpåsar für alle när Warhammer 3 äntligen blir lite kladdigare
    Blood for the Blood God släpps samtidigt som betan för Immortal Empires.  ( 7 min )
    Snabbkollen - Hur bra blir spelhösten 2022?
    Flipp, flopp eller mittemellan? Rösta!  ( 6 min )
    Förseningsvansinnet fortsätter - Evil West skjuts fram två månader
    Den tionde (!) förseningen vi rapporterar om i augusti.  ( 7 min )
    Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2:s kampanj släpps tidigare för digitala förhandsbokare
    Lira upp till en vecka innan resten av spelet släpps.  ( 6 min )
    PC Game Pass tycks antyda att Death Stranding är på väg till tjänsten
    Trots att Sony äger varumärket.  ( 6 min )
    En "Playstation PC launcher" nämns i Spider-Man Remastered-filerna
    Sony verkar ha stora pc-planer.  ( 6 min )
    Crusader Kings 3 höjer kraftigt priset på vissa DLC
    Och spelarna ställer sig frågande till tilltaget.  ( 6 min )
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    Comic for 2022.08.17 - Turn and Cough
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Images from the set of Amazon's Fallout series have leaked
    Images of Amazon's Fallout production set have leaked online. The images are said to have come from the in-production Fallout TV series in development for Amazon and appear to show the interior of Vault 32. Originally posted to the Fallout subreddit before being deleted, the images show a nursery, conference room, a delapidated farm, and a Vault Boy poster (thanks, RPS). Read more  ( 15 min )
    Bungie releases Destiny 2 trailer ahead of next week's showcase that teases what's to come in Season 18
    Bungie has released a teaser ahead of its Destiny 2 showcase scheduled for next week. You can check out the teaser below that takes a quick glimpse back at some of 2022’s best moments. On Tuesday, August 23, Bungie will stream its Destiny 2 Showcase and unveil the next expansion in the Light and Darkness saga: Lightfall. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Dying Light 2's first story DLC, Bloody Ties, to be revealed at gamescom Opening Night Live
    The first story DLC for Dying Light 2, Bloody Ties, will debut in a world premiere trailer at gamescom Opening Night Live on August 23. You can catch a teaser for the upcoming trailer below that offers a glimpse at the dangers lurking in Carnage Hall. Originally set to release earlier this year, Bloody Ties was moved into September so that Techland could give the DLC the "absolute highest level of polish" to meet players' expectations. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Planet of Lana release moved to spring 2023, coming day one to Xbox Game Pass
    The lovely cinematic puzzle adventure Planet of Lana will miss its planned 2022 release and will instead arrive during spring 2023. According to publisher Thunderful and independent studio Wishfully, the delay will provide the development team with extra time to ensure the game meets its full potential. "We’re sorry that completing development on Planet of Lana will take longer than initially expected, but we promise it will be worth the wait,” said Wishfully director Adam Stjarnljus. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Overwatch players can now merge console and PC accounts in preparation for Overwatch 2's release
    Overwatch players can now merge multiple accounts to carry progression and in-game cosmetics over to Overwatch 2 on a single profile. If you have a linked console account, you will be prompted at login to "identify, select, and confirm" the accounts you want to merge. Once approved, Blizzard will prepare your accounts to be merged during the release of Overwatch 2. The platforms included in account merge are Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo Switch, and PC. Read more  ( 15 min )
    I really hope Street Fighter 6 doesn’t get any guest characters
    It is honestly a really good time to be a fan of fighting games. Guilty Gear is good, there’s a new Smash alternative in Multiversus, there’s probably a new Netherrealm game on the horizon, there’s definitely a new Tekken coming, and Street Fighter 6 is well and truly on the way, in the thick of what’ll presumably be a relentless promotion cycle over the next nine months or so. There’s a lot of reasons to be excited for Street Fighter 6 in particular, too. For starters, Capcom’s fighting game unit is under new management, and the core creatives in charge of SF6 are the same guys who dragged Street Fighter 5 out of the gutter and ultimately made it a high quality and shockingly well-balanced game in its final seasons. It also looks really nice – in my opinion the best-looking 3D Street Fighter to date – thanks to both shrewd art direction and Capcom’s brilliant RE Engine technology. But one other thing I’m excited about based on what we know of the game so far is that it appears to be continuing a Street Fighter tradition - ducking the modern fighting game trend of guest characters. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Tower of Fantasy review: Genshin Impact’s newest rival will be lucky to survive the winter
    Tower of Fantasy seemed to ignite in hype and popularity overnight, right? Sure, those invested in this particular brand of RPG may have been aware of its arrival for some time, but who could have expected it to capture so much attention — to become the topic of conversation in gaming spaces. Off the back of this hype, I jumped in eager to see what’s going on among thousands of other like-minded folks. While initially great, the heat and hype radiating off Tower of Fantasy whittles away quickly. It’s a flashfire, catching your eye at first before smoldering to a quick and disappointing conclusion, burning up your time (and perhaps your wallet) in that fleeting moment. But what is Tower of Fantasy? First off, it’s not a brand-new game by any means. Released in China some time ago, the action-RPG has now been released globally for both mobile platforms and PC. It falls into the category of ‘ever expanding and ludicrously profitable open world Gacha ARPG’, a genre currently dominated by Genshin Impact in the west and with more and more titles with shared DNA trickling over. Read more  ( 22 min )
    Old School RuneScape gets new Tombs of Amascut raid August 24
    Old School RuneScape fans have something new to look forward too later this month, as a brand new raid is coming to the game on August 24. Called the Tombs of Amascut, players will have to delve deep into a fresh new environment for new loot including powerful weapons and armour. If you’re not at the pinnacle of OSRS progression, there’s no need to worry since the Tombs of Amascut features an invocation system that allows you to adjust the difficulty of different elements of the raid. These come in the forms of buffs and debuffs that alter that challenge you can expect to run into. This raid continues the story established in the Beneath Cursed Sands quest, and has players venture below the desert to stop Amascut’s nefarious plans. The raid itself is split into four main sections which can be completed in any order players choose, with each having its own unique puzzles and/or combat challenges. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Why 4 million people – and counting – are flocking to Korea’s hottest battle royale
    SUPER PEOPLE’s beta testing phase is drawing to a close, but ahead of the game’s general launch, there’s one last push from developer Wonder People to show the world at large what this new-fangled battle royale is all about before its full launch. That said, a lot of people will already be familiar with one of Korea’s hottest battle royale experiments: over 4 million people have played the game so far, and every new beta session has seen user numbers spike. But what is it that continues to draw people in – especially in a world where there’s so much competition in the genre? Director Seong-Gon Park from Wonder People explains. “From the time we first introduced SUPER PEOPLE, our core fun factor was clear,” they explain. “Although it is a battle royale, the fun of building up is clear due to the character and equipment growth factors. You can create your own strategies through super skills, and a variety of battles are produced rather than the same battle pattern. And even if you’re at a disadvantage, chances for reversal are always available.” Read more  ( 17 min )
    Grounded introduces Shared Worlds, making multiplayer much easier
    Grounded is the charming survival game that has remained in Early Access for a while now. Although, not for much longer, with the game slated to release on September 27 of this year. In the meantime, Obsidian is not neglecting updates for the game, with the latest change to be introduced involving Shared Worlds. The adventure itself sees takes Honey, I Shrunk The Kids and turns it into a video game. As a pint-sized version of your former self, you must navigate blades of grass and spar with unfriendly insects to get by. While the game is certainly fun to play solo, it reaches its full potential when played co-operatively with friends. That said, multiplayer can be relatively troublesome. Previously, co-op required one player - the host - to be online for anyone to play on that chosen world. Every time someone wanted to play, the host would need to be around. Now, obviously not everyone has the same schedules, and this can pose an issue. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Wild West God of War with guns, Evil West, is the latest game to suffer a delay
    Evil West, one of the few games we were counting on playing next month, has been pushed back by two months. The game will now be released on November 22. It's also been a little over two months since Evil Was was given a September release date, so we're hoping this is the last of its delays, because late November/early December release dates have a tendency to turn into Q1 of the following year. Publisher Focus Entertainment broke the news on Twitter in a joint statement with developer Flying Wild Hog. The statement explains that because the game is coming out on five platforms spanning two console generations (PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S), more time was simply needed to ensure the experience is polished on all of them. Read more  ( 15 min )
    PC Game Pass teases a new game and people reckon it's Death Stranding
    Last night, the official PC Game Pass Twitter account made a change to its social media profile that has set tongues wagging and made everyone a little bit dubious about what the hell is going on. The account, with a message that said “sometimes we just like a good landscape picture #newprofilepic” leads you to look at the new icon – which has a landscape seemingly reminiscent of Hideo Kojima's Death Stranding. If you click through to the picture and look beyond the Game Pass branding, you'll clock a landscape that looks quite a lot like the Icelandic-inspired landscapes you'll see in Kojima's latest sci-fi epic. The tweet below, for example, highlights some of the similarities to the image and what you'll see in the PlayStation and PC-only game. Read more  ( 17 min )
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    Försäljning av hårddiskar minskar med 15 procent
    En rapport för årets andra kvartal visar att försäljningen av hårddiskar minskar. Samtidigt är den levererade lagringskapaciteten stabil.  ( 5 min )
    Rösta fram de somrigaste bilderna i Samsungs fototävling
    Det är dags att rösta fram vinnarbilderna i Samsungs tävling. Dyk in i omröstning och uppfylls av sommarkänslor.  ( 6 min )
    Snabbtitt: Fractal Design Focus 2
    Calle och Jonas tar en titt på Fractal Designs nylanserade "budgetchassi" Focus 2, där modellens nedskalade utförande inte riktigt stämmer överens med prislappen.  ( 5 min )
    Logitech släpper hörlurar till Meta Quest 2
    Logitech vill förbättra ljudupplevelsen för användare av VR-headsetet Quest 2 genom att lansera hörlurstillbehöret Chorus.  ( 5 min )
    Sony kan ha PC-launcher på ingång
    Indikationer om att Sony har en Playstation-launcher på gång till PC har hittats i samband med nya Spider-Man Remastered.  ( 6 min )
    Sony verkar ha PC-launcher på ingång
    Indikationer om att Sony har en Playstation-launcher på gång till PC har hittats i samband med nya Spider-Man Remastered.  ( 5 min )
    Veckans fråga: Var har du din dator?
    Är du en skrytmåns och har din dator på en piedestal, eller är datormaskinen gömd långt in under skrivbordet? I veckans fråga undrar vi kort och gott var du har din dator.  ( 5 min )
    Skrivbordet Lumina Desk är försett med OLED-skärm
    Lumina Desk ger användare mer skärmyta tack vare en inbyggd OLED-panel på 24 tum.  ( 6 min )
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    Jonathan Dowland: dues (or blues)
    After I wrote hledger, I got some good feedback, both from a friend in-person and also on Twitter. My in-person friend asked, frankly, do I really try to manage money like this: tracking every single expense? Which affirms my suspicion, that many people don't, and that it perhaps isn't essential to do so. Combined with the details below, 3/4 of the way through my experiment with using hledger, I'm not convinced that it has been a good idea. I'm quoting my Twitter feedback here in order to respond. The context is handling when I have used the "wrong" card to pay for something: a card affiliated with my family expenses for something personal, or vice versa. With double-entry book-keeping, and one pair of transactions, the destination account can either record the expense category: 2022-08-20…  ( 2 min )
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    Untitled
    This is the description. Oh Oh yea, the link https://patreon.com/shencomix  ( 2 min )
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    What’s the difference between apt-get upgrade vs dist-upgrade?
    The apt-get upgrade and dist-upgrade are both used for upgrading the installed packages. So, what's the difference?  ( 24 min )
    Desktop Linux Market Share: August 2022
    Curious to know the latest market share percentage for Linux desktop? You don't have to do the research, we've done it for you.  ( 23 min )
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    Gen Z
    No content preview  ( 1 min )

  • Open

    Sony might be planning their own PC game launcher
    There are references to a "PlayStation PC launcher" within files for Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered's PC release, which launched last week. As spotted by VGC, the mention suggests Sony could launch their own bespoke game launcher on PC and allow players to link PC games to PlayStation Network accounts. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Flying citybuilder Airborne Kingdom is getting free DLC next month
    Airborne Kingdom, the chill citybuilder about constructing a city in the sky, is getting a free bit of DLC. Coming this September, Airborne Kingdom: The Lost Tundra will float your urban sprawl above an icy wasteland, and challenge you to keep your city flying in a biome which lacks food and water while your machinery freezes. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Evil West's vampire-hunting cowboys delayed, but only until November
    Evil West, Flying Wild Hog's third-person shooter about a vampire-hunting cowboy, has been delayed from its September release plans. If you're desperate to complete the unofficial trilogy of "____ West" games in 2022, then you're still in luck: Evil West will follow in Weird West and Hard West 2's cowboy boots by launching on November 22nd. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Spider-Man Remastered mods already let you dress up as Stan Lee, Miles Morales, and lots more
    It's taken mere days since the release of Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered on PC for players to crack open the game and noodle with its insides. Thus far the result is a slew of reskin mods which let you replace Spidey with other characters and play while looking like Kingpin, Miles Morales, Mary Jane, or - as pictured above - Stan Lee. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Get an RTX 3060 GPU for £279 thanks to this Ebay code
    Earlier today we looked at a deal on AMD's top graphics card, the RX 6950 XT, and now it's time to look at the opposite end of the market: one of Nvidia's cheapest RTX graphics cards. Ebay is running a promotion today that knocks 15% off the price of brand-new items when you use the code BANK15 at the checkout, and you can use this to pick an RTX 3060 12GB for just £279. This is a great price for this mid-range GPU, and it's especially rare to see features like hardware-accelerated ray tracing and DLSS image reconstruction at this price point. Read more  ( 16 min )
    AMD's fastest GPU, the RX 6950 XT, is £850 at Scan today
    Yesterday we took a look at the massive price drops affecting flagship Nvidia RTX graphics cards, and now it's time to see the best deal going on AMD's best and brightest. As RPS reader Skiddywinks points out, you can pick up the Radeon RX 6950 XT for £850 at Scan right now - about £200 cheaper than its UK RRP. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Immortals Fenyx Rising, Immortality, and more Zachtronics coming to Game Pass this month
    Microsoft have laid out their PC Game Pass plans for the second half of August, adding another eight games to the subscription service across the remaining weeks then removing eight at the end of the month. Additions include Zachtronics hacking game Exapunks and Ubisoft's child-friendly open world 'em up Immortals Fenyx Rising. Alas, games going include the wonderfully sad What Remains Of Edith Finch and wonderfully wonderful Hades. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Sci-fi MMO Dual Universe finally blasts out of beta in September
    Ambitious single-server sandbox MMO Dual Universe is setting course onto Steam on September 27th, after spending eight years in development hypersleep. For the past two years, the interstellar RPG has been in beta. There’s a two-week free trial planned for people who’ve played the game before, and Steam players will be able to have a go for free too, just on a different server. Get a glimpse of what’s been happening in the two-year-long beta in the trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Sidescrolling lost-world adventure Little Orpheus finally lands on PC in September
    Dear Esther and Everybody’s Gone To The Rapture devs The Chinese Room are bringing their postponed cosmonaut adventure Little Orpheus to PC on September 13th. The game had originally been due to launch on March 1st but was delayed. Little Orpheus stars a Soviet Russian character, and the devs wanted to review its content before release out of sensitivity to the conflict in Ukraine. Check out the trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Guild Wars 2 rides its dragon onto Steam on August 23rd
    Long-running fantasy MMORPG Guild Wars 2 will hop onto Steam on August 23rd, not quite ten years to the day since it launched in August 2012. Can you even remember what you were doing then? I was getting my wedding organised. Have a watch of the announcement trailer below. For Guild Wars 2 coming to Steam, not my wedding. We just didn’t have that kind of budget. Read more  ( 16 min )
    If you like inventory tetris, check out the dungeon crawler Backpack Hero
    Excellent roguelikelike dungeon crawler Backpack Hero launched into early access this week, and it's absolutely worth a go if you enjoy shuffle items around your inventory grid. Backpack Hero is all about arranging weapons and items inside your massive sack to develop powerful synergies, see. Some items buff items touching them, while others benefit from empty spaces, or some insist upon being in a certain grid row, and some even move around by themselves. The buildcrafting gets fiendishly fun as your critter delves deeper into dungeons in search of a giant hunk of cheese. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Unity rejects AppLovin’s $17.5b takeover offer
    Unity Software have chosen to reject a $17.54 billion (£14.58 billion) all-stock takeover offer from mobile gaming technology company AppLovin to instead pursue their own planned merger with AppLovin’s rival ironSource. Unity’s board of directors unanimously cast aside the AppLovin offer, which hadn’t been sought by the game engine company, after a “thorough financial and strategic evaluation”. The board has recommended that shareholders vote against AppLovin’s offer. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Disney's Marvel Games Showcase will reveal first look at Amy Hennig's Marvel ensemble project
    Disney and Marvel have revealed they’ll be hosting a joint games showcase for the first time during this year’s D23 Expo. The in-person and digital showcase starts at 1pm PST/4pm EST/9pm BST on September 9th. Have a watch of the very concise trailer below to get an idea of what’s being shown at the event. Read more  ( 17 min )
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    SEC says brokerage accounts hijacked for $1.3m pump-and-dump scam
    18 people and businesses charged, one giant web of connections America's financial watchdog has accused 18 individuals and shell companies of using compromised brokerage accounts to manipulate stock prices to rake in $1.3 million in illicit profits.…  ( 6 min )
    Dinobabies latest: IBM settles with widow of exec who killed himself after layoff
    Big Blue certainly seems blue about letting any of these claims go to trial IBM has settled the age-discrimination case brought against it by the widow of a sales executives who took his own life after being laid off.…  ( 5 min )
    AMD has a lot riding on its 5nm Ryzen 7000 CPUs. And so here begins the hype
    You'll need a new motherboard, RAM, beefier PSU. But hey, at least GPUs are cheap again AMD’s Ryzen 7000-series microprocessors will officially launch later this month during the company’s “together we advance PC” virtual event, where CEO Lisa Su and CTO Mark Papermaster will showcase the chipmaker’s Zen 4-based CPU cores.…  ( 6 min )
    Apple to compel workers to spend '3 days a week' in the office
    Mandate starts in September, staff say its about 'fear of worker autonomy' Apple has told its workforce they must come into the office for at least three days a week from September to get back to "in-person collaboration."…  ( 4 min )
    Discord details how it dodged latency with a super-disk made in the cloud
    For when a GCP Local SSD is just not quite reliable enough Chat platform Discord delivered a playful slap to Google yesterday with a post describing how the company dealt with "reliability issues" to achieve some impressively low latency.…  ( 5 min )
    PC store told it can't claim full cyber-crime insurance after social-engineering attack
    Two different kinds of fraud, says judge while throwing out lawsuit against insurer A Minnesota computer store suing its crime insurance provider has had its case dismissed, with the courts saying it was a clear instance of social engineering, a crime for which the insurer was only liable to cover a fraction of total losses.…  ( 6 min )
    Microsoft tests new features in last year’s Windows 10
    Still waiting for 22H2? Have a 21H2 release preview to tide you over Remember 2021? Microsoft does, and has emitted a fresh build to the Windows Insider Release Preview channel for Windows 10 21H2, with a few useful fixes, including one where Edge will stop responding when Internet Explorer mode is on.…  ( 5 min )
    PC and mobile DRAM demand down while server memory holds up, says Trendforce
    Samsung, SK hynix, Micron benefit most but there are signs that pricing and shipment growth are weakening The DRAM industry saw an increase in revenue for the second quarter of 2022 as some suppliers managed to expand the total bits shipped, but the PC and mobile markets weakened in response to inflation, while the server memory market continued to hold up.…  ( 5 min )
    Microsoft's macOS Tamper Protection hits general availability
    A boon for administrators having to deal with Apple hardware while also keeping everything secure Microsoft Defender for Endpoint's Tamper Protection in macOS has entered general availability.…  ( 5 min )
    Broadcom challenges Nvidia's Spectrum-4 with 51.2T switch silicon
    Double the bandwidth of previous gen and 6x reduction in power consumption Broadcom says it has doubled the capacity of its merchant switch silicon with the launch of the 51.2Tbps Tomahawk5 ASIC this week.…  ( 5 min )
    1,900 Signal users exposed: Twilio attacker 'explicitly' looked for certain numbers
    Bad guy also got SMS verification codes, and re-registered one of the numbers they searched for The security breach at Twilio earlier this month affected at least one high-value customer, Signal, and led to the exposure of the phone number and SMS registration codes for 1,900 users of the encrypted messaging service, it confirmed.…  ( 5 min )
    Ryugu asteroid: It came from the outer solar system, say scientists
    Japanese Hayabusa-2 probe samples reveal coarse-grained phyllosilicates that may have served as 'cradles' for organics and water Scientists examining samples from the asteroid Ryugu retrieved by the Japanese Hayabusa-2 probe have concluded that Ryugu is a drifter from the outer solar system.…  ( 5 min )
    Microsoft Azure cloud region settles over desert in Doha, Qatar
    Opening was delayed during that pandemic thing Microsoft Azure launched a long-awaited new cloud region in Doha, Qatar, on Monday.…  ( 4 min )
    Reckon Russian spies are lurking in your inbox? Check for these IOCs, Microsoft says
    Seaborgium targeted dozens of orgs this year alone Microsoft said it disabled accounts used by Russian-linked Seaborgium troupe to phish and steal credentials from its customers as part of the cybercrime gang's illicit spying and data-stealing activities.…  ( 6 min )
    UK government lines up billions to refresh legacy tech in 600-system UK tax dept
    Let's hope DALAS procurement is a tad more sensible than its soap opera namesake The UK government's commercial wing has begun to set up a contracting agreement set to be worth up to £4.5 billion ($5.4 billion) for application software services supporting the nation's tax collector.…  ( 5 min )
    Ninefold increase in startup layoffs in Q2 follows economic uncertainty
    Industry set to readjust to new realities of raising cash The second quarter of 2022 has seen more than nine times the number of layoffs from tech startups than the first, according to industry figures.…  ( 4 min )
    This tiny Intel Xeon-toting PC board can take your Raspberry Pi any day
    Did someone say ECC on an SBC? That Raspberry Pi 4B feeling a bit pokey? Asus' Aaeon division has managed to fit an eight-core Xeon processor, complete with error correcting memory (ECC) support, and a PCIe 4.0 x8 slot into a four-inch single board computer.…  ( 5 min )
    Philippines orders fraud probe after paying MacBook prices for slow Celeron laptops
    Education Department planned to buy 70,000 laptops, blew its budget and bought just 40,000 When COVID-19 closed schools in The Philippines, the nation’s government acted to ensure its teachers had the kit they needed to keep working by allocating funds to acquire nearly 70,000 laptops.…  ( 4 min )
    World record for strongest steady magnetic field 'broken' by Chinese team
    Superconductive hybrid magnet claimed to be 4,500 times stronger than a fridge stick-on Chinese scientists claim to have broken the record for producing the strongest steady magnetic field, one that's at least a million times more powerful than planet Earth's, using a superconducting system. …  ( 6 min )
    Supply chain worries heat up again as China shuts down factories to cool its citizens
    Scorching weather sees scarce juice diverted to aircon instead of laptops and lithium A heatwave in China has disrupted operations at laptop component makers and assemblers in Sichuan province and the municipality of Chongqing this week, creating the possibility of further problems in tech supply chains.…  ( 5 min )
    Digital Ocean dumps Mailchimp after attack leaked customer email addresses
    Somebody went after crypto-centric companies’ outsourced email but the damage was felt in the cloud Junior cloud Digital Ocean has revealed that some of its clients’ email addresses were exposed to attackers, thanks to an attack on email marketing service Mailchimp.…  ( 5 min )
    Ant Group’s in-house DB set for global release, including Raspberry Pi edition
    OceanBase 4.0 is derived from tech behind Alipay and is MySQL compatible Ant Group, the financial services company spun out of Chinese tech giant Alibaba, has created a database it's claiming is a speedy and scalable alternative to MySQL, and will soon market it widely in China and beyond.…  ( 4 min )
    After suffering $1b subsidy snub, Starlink lands $2m US Air Force deal
    Always look on the bright (oh God, they are so bright) side of life The US Air Force is giving $1.9 million to SpaceX to test if Starlink can support military bases in Europe and Africa.…  ( 4 min )
    It's 2022 and there are still thousands of public systems using password-less VNC
    Let alone the ones with 123456 to login. How sophisticated do attackers really need to be? Thousands of machines on the public internet can be remotely controlled via VNC without any authentication, a cybersecurity vendor has reminded us this month.…  ( 6 min )
    Oh Deere: Farm hardware jailbroken to run Doom
    Corn-y demo heralded as right-to-repair win At DEF CON 30 on Saturday, an Australian who goes by the handle Sick Codes showed off a way to fully take control of some John Deere farming machine electronics to run first-person shooter Doom.…  ( 6 min )
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    Growing Pain
    No content preview
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    When context is key: “Hunger stones” go viral, but news first broke in 2018
    Landmark stones recorded low-water levels during droughts to warn future generations.  ( 7 min )
    Sweeping report alleges inequity, sexual harassment at Nintendo’s American HQ
    NoA full-timers accused of "using the tester pool of associates as a dating pool."  ( 5 min )
    Deadly swatting increasing on Twitch; alarmed streamers press for change
    Some streamers report multiple swatting attempts weekly.  ( 6 min )
    Will the Nintendo Switch ever see a price drop?
    The best-selling console has sat at $299.99 for an unprecedented five-plus years.  ( 6 min )
    Report: Windows 11 22H2 update will be released on September 20
    22H2 includes security upgrades, redesigned Task Manager, and other refinements.  ( 5 min )
    Musk wins one, loses 21 others as judge denies access to many Twitter records
    Twitter must produce documents from a fired executive—but Musk wanted a lot more.  ( 5 min )
    Pixel 6 owners who upgrade to Android 13 can never go back
    Anti-rollback enforcement disables downgrades for Google's latest devices.  ( 5 min )
    Almost-certain Nest Wifi appears at FCC with Wi-Fi 6E on-board
    What looks like Google's next mesh Wi-Fi router could offer better backhaul.  ( 5 min )
    Lord of the Rings mechanical keyboards are perfect for people who speak Elvish
    Keyboards build on Drop's November release of LotR keycap sets.  ( 6 min )
    Court rules FCC is allowed to reassign 5.9 GHz bandwidth, killing V2X
    Bandwidth was set aside in 1999, but V2X has been an abject failure.  ( 5 min )
    Microbiologist tries at-home test kits to see what they reveal about microbiome
    You and the trillions of microbes in your gut can live in harmony.  ( 5 min )
    After ICBM test, US stresses it was “not the result of current world events”
    Test comes after delays due to Russia, China tensions.  ( 5 min )
    De-extinction company sets its next (first?) target: The thylacine
    We killed the last thylacine about a century ago. Can we correct that mistake?  ( 7 min )
    Review: Das Keyboard’s MacTigr is a snappy, but limited, Mac mechanical
    Despite quality typing, power users may want more features.  ( 6 min )
    Amazon accuses FTC of harassing executives including Jeff Bezos and Andy Jassy
    Retail giant hits out at US regulator’s tactics in probe into Prime memberships.  ( 5 min )
    First look at del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities is magically macabre
    “The world is beautiful and horrible, at exactly the same time…”  ( 5 min )
    CDC to regain control of US hospital data after Trump-era seizure, chaos
    TeleTracking, which has personal ties to Trump, made over $50M in federal contracts.  ( 6 min )
    As Big Tech grapples with caste-based discrimination, Apple explicitly bans it
    Workers allege that casteism influences how companies hire and promote talent.  ( 6 min )
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    Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 open beta and multiplayer reveal dated
    Beta dates for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 have been announced, along with when we'll get a look at the multiplayer campaign. First, let's start with information on the tester, which will be split into two playable weekends. The dates and prerequisites are a bit different for each platform, so pay close attention to the information below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    MultiVersus datamine suggests Beetlejuice and Oz’s Wicked Witch of the West are coming to the game
    A new leak suggests that announcer packs for the Wicked Witch of the West from The Wizard of Oz and Beetlejuice are coming to MultiVersus. The leak comes from a datamine, so neither character is confirmed, but voice lines found in the mine seem to indicate the Wicked Witch will be an announcer and that Beetlejuice will be conversing with her. MultiVersus leaker AisulMV posted clips of the lines earlier this week, but the Beetlejuice lines were taken off Twitter due to a copyright claim (thanks, Polygon). Read more  ( 15 min )
    Xbox Game Pass is losing some brilliant games soon
    The latest titles to come to Xbox Game Pass have been announced, and while there's some good titles on the way, it's also that time of the month again where we commiserate the great games that are soon to be leaving. Amongst the titles leaving is NBA 2K22, Two Point Hospital, and Elite: Dangerous. So, I've bad news for both avid space explorers, basketball pros, and hospital managers alike, as all three will be bidding farewell to Xbox Games Pass on August 31. This isn't all, either. There's truly a cracking line-up of titles leaving in just a couple of weeks, which consists of a few quaint but enjoyable indie titles. These include Spiritfarer, Twelve Minutes, What Remains of Edith Finch, and Signs of the Sojourner. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Saints Row trailer gives you a taste of the story
    Check out this rather interesting story trailer for Saints Row. The video gives you a taste of the Saints' formation, rivals, and rise to power. It also features all sorts of explosions. Set in Santo Ileso, a brand new location located in the American Southwest, the reboot stars a group of friends who embark on a criminal venture in a bid to become Self Made. Read more  ( 15 min )
    LEGO Bricktales coming to consoles and PC later this year
    The LEGO Group and Thunderful have announced platforms and a release window for the upcoming adventure game LEGO Bricktales. In development with Clockstone, the studio that brought you Bridge Constructor, the game finds you traveling across a range of diorama biomes built from LEGO bricks. The new digital adventure features a storyline and five LEGO-themed biomes such as a jungle, desert, a busy city corner, a medieval castle, and a tropical Caribbean island full of secrets and interesting characters. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Thymesia reviews round-up - all the scores
    OverBorder Studio's first project is one that may be biting off more than it can chew. Thymesia is a Souls-like inspired mainly by Bloodborne, with a few hints of Sekiro thrown in for good measure. The indie game arrives this Thursday, August 18, but is it worth playing? Well, that's what we hope this story will answer. As we like to do, we've rounded up all of the review scores from games media to help you make a decision. Thymesia is a challenging game of deflects, dodges and a Plague mechanic that wants you to keep up the pressure. Attacking enemies in Thymesia only wounds them, befitting the plague doctor theme. To truly kill an enemy, you must capitalise on the advantage, turning temporary wounds into permanent damage. Read more
    NFL Blitz returns in a thrilling new package via Arcade1Up – but the league really needs to get over itself
    NFL Blitz, one of the best sporting video games ever created, is finally making a comeback in a remastered form thanks to the home arcade company Arcade1Up – marking the first new entry in the wider Blitz franchise since 2012, and the first re-release of the 90s classics since 2001. Blitz really is something special. I suspect some of the readers of VG247 may not have even been alive when these games first released, but they’re basically the ultimate in arcade sports, alongside NBA Jam (which happens to have been headed up by some of the same development staff). In short, Blitz takes the sport of American Football and dials everything up to 11 – making it faster, sillier, and more full-on. It was designed to provoke intense competition between friends in the arcade. And also, of course, drain you of your coins. There were a few iterations in arcades and on console between 1997 and 2001, but later entries lost much of what made the originals special. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscribers: don't miss out on your bonus MultiVersus perk in August
    You probably don't need me to tell you that Reindog is quietly one of the best support class characters in MultiVersus, do you? Between his tether that just piles on the damage to anyone caught in the middle and his control of the battlefield with tricky little projectiles, he's a half-reindeer, half-canine force to be reckoned with. So, to that end, you want to make him look the part whenever you use him. Luckily for you, as of August 23, you'll be able to claim a free in-game MVP Pack that features the Battle Reindog variant (which sees the adorable hybrid animal don armour and a little neckerchief) as well as the Waterfall Banner, and the Dark Matter Ringout Effect. This pack was previously excluisve to PS+ users over on the PlayStation side of things, but it seems as we've moved from July to August, the freebie has flipped platforms, too. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Immortals Fenyx Rising, Commandos 3 – HD Remaster, Midnight Fight Express, more coming to Xbox Game Pass
    Microsoft has announced the next batch of titles coming to Xbox Game Pass and PC Game Pass. Titles include Immortality, Tinykin, Immortals Fenyx Rising, Coffee Talk, Commandos 3 - HD Remaster and more. First up is today's release of Coffee Talk, the coffee brewing and talking simulator we told you about earlier. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Guild Wars 2 arrives on Steam this month, with new complete collection available
    Guild Wars 2 is a free-to-play MMORPG that you’ve no doubt already heard of. First released back in 2012 and privy to plenty of expansions since, it has been announced that the game will be coming to Steam on August 23. This is the first time that Guild Wars 2 has been made available on a third-party platform, and a new Steam trailer has been made available for the launch. Those who use Steam will be able to jump into the fantasy-fuelled MMORPG as of next week, August 23, without the need to spend a penny or start a new subscription; something that Guild Wars 2 appears to pride itself in. Read more  ( 15 min )
    First-ever Disney and Marvel Games Showcase will take place at this year’s D23 Expo
    A joint showcase between Disney and Marvel will be held during the D23 Expo on Friday, September 9. During the digital showcase, you can expect to see new content from Disney and Pixar Games, Marvel Games, Lucasfilm Games, and 20th Century Games. In addition to all-new announcements, the showcase will feature reveals from titles including Disney Dreamlight Valley, Marvel’s Midnight Suns, LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga, and a sneak peek at the upcoming Marvel ensemble game from Skydance New Media. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Thymesia review: A bargain bin Bloodborne, for better and for worse
    It’s not hard to find something to like about Thymesia, the new souls-like from OverBorder Studio. Your overall feelings on the game, however, will be dictated by how much you end up enjoying its best qualities. Thymesia is a Souls-like action RPG set in a Bloodborne-esque world whose people sought to better their lives through chemistry alchemy. Only, instead of using it sparingly, their unbridled reliance on it left their kingdom in ruins. You play as Corvus, an amnesiac plague doctor of sorts, who may have had a hand in the creation of a concoction that could save the kingdom, and put an end to experimentation with alchemy. But his memory of the ingredients is shaky, so you go around the game’s three main zones in search of – effectively – lore that helps you piece it all together, and hopefully arrive at the right formula. Read more  ( 21 min )
    Fortnite x Dragon Ball crossover event adds Goku Vegeta to the game today
    Fortnite is getting a hefty power level increase today, as the Dragon Ball crossover event has started. This limited time promotion adds Goku, Vegeta, Beerus and Bulma to the game, as well as a variety of exclusive challenges, activities, and rewards for those who jump in. This event has already kicked off and continues until August 30, at which point the quests and Dragon Ball themed content will be phased out. The first thing you’ll notice when booting up Fortnite is a new Power Unleashed tab - this is a power metre that you can push higher and higher by completing a set of limited challenges available for the duration of the event. Filling this up will grant exclusive Dragon Ball cosmetics for you to collect, and completing them all will earn you the Shenron Glider! Read more  ( 16 min )
    Xbox Game Pass gets surprise addition with another indie hit
    If you're attentive enough, you'll have noticed that the game has graced the Xbox services before – it was one of the games that came free with your subscription back in June 2020. It's a similar game to the sublime VA11 Hall-A, if you've ever played that. The game sells itself as a "late-night café game" set in a sorta sci-fi version of Seattle – but it comes with a twist: the city is populated by orcs, humans, elves and other assorted mythical creatures. The game weaves in and out of the barista experience, casting you as both a coffee expert, and a friendly ear for the human and inhuman residents of the alt-reality city. Set against an aural backdrop of lo-fi beats, and brimming with cosy and incessently pleasant converastions, the game celebrates making you a mute observer, looking in on the lives of many people coming and going from your humble store. Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    Hard Drive Quarterly Sales Volume Dropped 15% Due to Weakening Demand
    A new report has come in detailing a 15% drop in hard drive sales volume for the past quarter, thanks to weakened demand in the consumer market.  ( 59 min )
    Asus AMD X670E Motherboards Listed, Starting at $670
    AMD X670E-based AM5 motherboards from Asus listed, ready for next-generation Ryzen 7000-series processors and starting at $670.  ( 59 min )
    Chinese Exascale Supercomputer Faces Frontier in Gordon Bell Prize
    The Chinese supercomputer OceanLight has just made it into the top five finalists in the Gordon Bell prize, steadfastly facing the premier US Frontier exascale supercomputer.  ( 59 min )
    Elephant Robotics Release Raspberry Pi Dual-Armed Robot
    Prolific robotics firm releases first robot with two programmable arms.  ( 59 min )
    Intel Arc A380 Graphics Card Listing Shows Up On Newegg
    Intel's Arc A380 is no longer locked behind Chinese borders, with the GPU now apparently shipping to the United States.  ( 59 min )
    Samsung Launches Curved 55-Inch Odyssey Ark Gaming Monitor at $3,499
    Samsung’s curvy big “personal gaming theater” offers thrilling features like cockpit mode, sound dome technology, a remote dial OSD controller, and a $3,499 price tag.  ( 63 min )
    Nvidia to Further Drop Prices of GeForce RTX 30-Series Boards in Coming Weeks
    Nvidia’s Ampere graphics cards are reportedly set to get cheaper in the coming weeks, ahead of the Ada Lovelace RTX 40-series launch.  ( 60 min )
    Das Keyboard MacTigr Review
    The MacTigr is a low-profile wired mechanical keyboard designed specifically for Mac users.  ( 62 min )
    7-Zip Benchmark: Intel Core i9-13900K 60% Faster Compared To 12900K
    A new 7-Zip benchmark result reveals a 60% performance improvement for the 13900K in decompression tests, and 20% in compression tests in comparison to the 12900K.  ( 59 min )
    AMD’s Ryzen 7000 Launch Event Scheduled for Aug 29
    The event has been dubbed “Together We Advance PCs,” and you can expect a fairly deep dive into Zen 4 and AM5 platform advances and what they will mean to PC enthusiasts and DIYers.  ( 59 min )
    Raspberry Pi Pico Powers Pocket Gaming Console
    Grgo Mariani has created a pocket-sized gaming console using the Raspberry Pi Pico microcontroller as its main processor.  ( 62 min )
    ASRock Z690 Extreme WiFi 6E Review: Best Z690 Under $200?
    ASRock’s Z690 Extreme WiFi is a well-rounded option in the crowded $200 space. It offers three M.2 sockets, eight SATA ports, dual Ethernet ports, integrated Wi-Fi 6E, and a quality last-gen audio codec. The all-black look and bright RGB lightning help the Extreme stand out inside your chassis.  ( 68 min )
  • Open

    Proton 7.0-4 is live bringing more compatibility to Linux and Steam Deck
    Valve has today released Proton 7.0-4 after a short period in public testing, this brings further compatibility of Windows games on Linux desktop and Steam Deck.  ( 4 min )
    Fab deck-builder Across the Obelisk out now under Paradox Arc publishing
    Across the Obelisk is a fantastic deck-builder that just left Early Access, as the first game under Paradox Interactive's new publishing label Paradox Arc.  ( 4 min )
    Twin-stick shooter Titan Shell looks intense and will be supported on Linux
    Titan Shell is an in-development twin-stick shooter from Meatbag Studio that blends in features from roguelikes / rogue-lites to offer a pretty interesting experience not many such shooters give you.  ( 4 min )
    Axiom Verge 2 lands on Steam with Linux support and Steam Deck Verified
    Axiom Verge 2 from Thomas Happ Games has jumped over from the Epic Store to Steam and it comes with Native Linux support and it is also Steam Deck Verified!  ( 4 min )
    Dreamed Away is an upcoming emotional action-adventure RPG set in France
    Love your cute and colourful little adventures? Dreamed Away from Nicolas Petton / Pineapple Works looks like it's worth keeping an eye on.  ( 4 min )
    Backpack Hero is an inventory management roguelike and my new favourite game
    Backpack Hero is a dungeon crawling roguelike where you need to constantly sort out your small backpack and it's absolutely sucked me in.  ( 5 min )
    Couch-gaming Linux distro ChimeraOS 34 released
    ChimeraOS continues to improve the couch-gaming experience for Linux with ChimeraOS 34 out now and there's quite a number of improvements and fixes.  ( 4 min )
    Steam finally gets easier to grab free stuff
    It seems Valve has made it easier to claim free stuff on the Steam store, so you no longer need to quickly try to install something free and back out of it to claim it.  ( 4 min )
    Valve improves Steam Deck offline mode with more to come
    Valve has put out a small upgrade for the Steam Deck in the Beta and Preview channels that seeks to improve the offline mode.  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Shadow Warrior dev's vampiric cowboy shooter Evil West delayed to November
    Evil West, the vampire-tinged cowboy shooter from Shadow Warrior reboot developer Flying Wild Hogs, has been delayed again, and is now scheduled to launch on 22nd November. Announced back in 2020, Evil West follows the gunslinging adventures of Jesse Rentier as he prowls the American frontier in search of vampiric monstrosities to destroy. It all unfolds in classic third-person action style, and is playable either co-operatively with a friend or solo. Previously, Evil West was due to launch on 20th September (and before that late 2021), but a Twitter statement shared by Focus Entertainment today explained the publisher and Flying Wild Hogs have made the decision to shift the game's release back to November in order to "ensure [it] reaches its full potential". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Life is Strange's delayed Switch remaster collection finally arrives in September
    After a lengthy delay, Square Enix's two-game Life is Strange remaster bundle finally has a release date on Switch, and will be launching on 27th September. Square's new Switch bundle - which goes by the name Life is Strange: Arcadia Bay Collection, rather than the Remastered Collection moniker used on other platforms - includes remastered versions of developer Don't Nod's much-loved original Life is Strange and its Deck-Nine-developed prequel Life is Strange: Before the Storm. This new collection - which was originally due to launch on 1st February alongside other platforms before recieving a last-minute delay - retains the same acclaimed narrative core as the originals, following the supernaturally imbued adventures of teenage friends Max and Chloe, but promises a range of enhancements on Switch. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Files in Spider-Man Remastered suggest Sony may release its own PC launcher
    Since its release last week, fans have been diving into the files of Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered. It has turned out some interesting stuff, such as a potential scrapped multiplayer mode for the game. Most recently, however, dataminers have found evidence that Sony is looking into releasing its own PC launcher in the future (via VGC), with references to such a project being tucked away inside Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered. While this has not been officially confirmed, it does tie in with other speculation across the web. Earlier in the year, a job listing for PlayStation was advertised, with the company looking for a "director, product management - PC game experiences". Read more  ( 16 min )
    Here is some new footage from the remake of the XIII remake
    After a pretty dismal launch in 2020 that was widely panned by gamers and critics alike, French studio Tower Five has been hard at work remaking the XIII remake. Now, we have been given a look at some of the new gameplay for the cel-shaded shooter, which shows over three minutes of footage from the SPADS Military Base sequence. And, in my opinion, it certainly looks better. You can see it for yourself below. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Next wave of Xbox Game Pass games includes Immortality, Immortals Fenyx Rising and Tinykin
    It's time for another wave of Xbox Game Pass games! Out today on cloud, console and PC is Coffee Talk, a coffee-brewing and heart-to-heart talking simulator set in an alternative Seattle. Next week, on 23rd August, cloud, console and PC get Midnight Fight Express, a "brutal and hyper-kinetic brawling ballet". That's one of those day-one Game Pass releases - more of those to come. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Rollerdrome review - Roll7 delivers a game of impossible style
    Is it possible to quantify cool? Rollerdrome, the latest from the skatemasters of Roll7, certainly thinks so. Skating games have always had scores, and have always had that essential breezy nonchalance at their heart, but Rollerdrome feels like the first to really make the coolness so explicit. This is a game where, locked into a series of retrofuture colosseums, you chain elaborate roller skate tricks while dodging rockets, ducking batons and pounding shotgun pellets into riot shields in ultra-slow motion. Coolness is something that evaporates as soon as you say it out loud, so of course it's never mentioned, but the end-of-round score could be for nothing else. Mark me down as a square, though, because I am pretty terrible at Rollerdrome, despite its efforts to convince me otherwise.…  ( 18 min )
    A decade after launch, Guild Wars 2 finally comes to Steam next week
    Long-running MMO Guild Wars 2 finally hits Steam on 23rd August. The Steam launch marks the first time ArenaNet's Guild Wars 2, which launched a decade ago on 28th August 2012, is available on a third-party platform. Players on both Steam and the NCSoft first-party Guild Wars 2 client will be able to play together on the same servers, NCSoft confirmed. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Quaint city builder Townscaper coming to VR in October
    The idyllic, peaceful city builder Townscaper will make its way to VR in October. From 6th October, the game will be available on Meta Quest VR and PICO headsets. A trailer below shows the VR version in action. Read more  ( 14 min )
    The gorgeous Lego Bricktales comes out on Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo Switch and PC later in 2022
    The gorgeous Lego Bricktales comes out on Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo Switch and PC during the fourth quarter of 2022 (Oct-Dec). Lego Bricktales is a diorama-based construction puzzler from ClockStone, the maker of the popular Bridge Constructor series. You journey across five different LEGO-themed biomes and use a brick-by-brick building mechanic to solve puzzles. Expect plenty of physics-based puzzles, such as building cranes and gyrocopters. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Grounded developer announces new 'Shared World' feature
    A new and long-awaited feature for Grounded has been revealed by developer Obsidian. This feature, known as 'Shared World', allows players to create and "own" up to three shared worlds (hence the name) which will then be stored in the cloud. These can then be shared with friends and family to enable them to host that world "while you are not online". In turn, each player can also have up to 50 worlds shared with them at any given time. In addition to this, Obsidian states that any player's standard worlds can be changed to a shared world if they wish. This is done through the game's save and load menu. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Looks like Beetlejuice and the Wicked Witch of the West are coming to MultiVersus
    Yesterday, Gremlins antagonist Stripe and DC's Black Adam leaked ahead of their official reveal by Warner Bros. as coming to MultiVersus' eclectic roster. Well, now we have another leak, and it appears that more unexpected characters will also be joining the brawler further down the road, with voice lines for both The Wizard of Oz's Wicked Witch of the West and BeetleJuice being found in the game's files. As shared by MultiVersus Twitter user AisulMV (the same leaker who discovered hints about a potential feature which will allow players to share their battle pass progress), the lines of dialogue found appear to be setting MultiVersus up for a spooky season. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Doom is now playable on a tractor
    It's something of an industry joke that iconic 90s shooter Doom is playable on almost anything. Now it's playable on a tractor. There's a more serious background to this, though. As Wired reports, a hacker known as Sick Codes presented a new jailbreak for John Deere & Co. tractors at the DefCon security conference in Las Vegas. Digital locks are imposed on vehicles by manufacturers, preventing farmers from modifying and repairing their own equipment. The right-to-repair has proven controversial in the farming industry, but Sick Codes has found a workaround. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Paradox doubling price of Crusader Kings 3 DLC
    Paradox, the developer of strategy game Crusader Kings 3, is doubling the price of the game's DLC packs. Currently priced at $6.99 (£5.19 in the UK), the Flavour Packs will cost $12.99 from 13th September. In a forum post (thanks TheGamer), the developer said it was "altering the prices of our Flavour Packs (Northern Lords and Fate of Iberia) to reflect the overall value of this kind of content moving forward". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Tokyo Game Show VR 2022 to feature Kojima Productions, Square Enix and more
    Square Enix and Kojima Productions will be taking part in the Tokyo Game Show's upcoming VR event. Bandai Namco, Capcom and Konami, to name but a few, will also be exhibiting at the event, which takes place between 15th and 18th September. The site for the show itself is shrouded in mystery for now, with the organisers simply teasing the stage for this event is a "dungeon" and the following text: Read more  ( 15 min )
    SteamVR updates notes include literal bugs
    Yesterday, Valve updated its SteamVR software, for use on VR headsets, and had some unusual content in the update notes. In the full list, the usual gamut of notes that you'd expect like bug fixes and quality of life improvements are detailed. But above all that, there's a literal bug fix. For all you insect lovers. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The Fortnite x Dragon Ball crossover is now live
    As teased last week, the Dragon Ball and Fortnite crossover is now live. Four iconic characters are available in the game - Son Goku, Vegeta, Bulma, and Beerus - as well as a number of new quests and modes. Players will now find a new Power Unleashed tab containing special limited-time quests and rewards that will track your rising Power Level. There are seven sets of quests and with each completed, players will earn a Dragon Ball - collect all seven to earn the Shenron Glider. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Wave Race 64 splashes on to Nintendo Switch Online this week
    Wave Race 64 is the next N64 game to be added to Nintendo Switch Online. The game will be available for Expansion Pack members from 19th August. Released in 1996, the jet ski racer was a launch window release for the console and was praised for its realistic water physics. And yes, you can ride a dolphin. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Rocket League – There’s still grip on these tyres
    My introduction to Rocket League was suitably chaotic. A friend had secured beta access, setting up 4v4 matches with six other people across two TVs. We played for hours. Between the unlikely goals, great assists, and questionable demolition tactics, I loved every moment. There isn’t a game that encapsulates the “just one more round” mentality better than Rocket League. It's currently my most played game of all time, each explosive match calling out for another, and I wasn't alone in being hooked. Psyonix knew it had a hit, partnering with Sony to make it a “free” PS Plus game at launch, sealing the deal for many. Seven years later, Rocket League remains a winner. Rocket League splits players into teams and asks them to score goals - using rocket powered cars rather than feet, and employing a ball that absolutely towers over them on the pitch. Competing to score the most points before time runs out – if you’re drawing after 5 mins, say hello to overtime and sudden death – you’ve got a few tricks at your disposal. Boost pads are evenly spread across the field to provide a speed advantage, for instance, letting us shoot at pace or demolish an opponent’s vehicle if we collide at max speed. If you fancy trying something more technical, jump up and use that boost for an aerial shot. As you might have gathered, Rocket League is primarily multiplayer focused, placing heavy emphasis on team strategy and player rotation. You won’t find set positions like in a football match, though setting up assists from the midfield or staying behind as goalkeeper often feels natural. Co-ordinating with teammates is key and victory always feels better together. Read more  ( 19 min )
    Disney promises "sneak peek" at Amy Hennig's Marvel game in September
    Disney has announced it's hosting a game-focused digital showcase this September, with a "sneak peek" at Amy Hennig's new Marvel game promising to be a highlight. The Disney & Marvel Games Showcase, which is running as part of this year's D23 Expo, will be streamed on Friday, 9th September, at 9pm in the UK/1pm PT. It's promising "all-new announcements" alongside additional details on previously revealed games. There'll be more from Disney Dreamlight Valley, for instance, alongside additional news on Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga and the recently delayed Marvel's Midnight Suns. The real draw, though, unless you really love your village life sims, is a glimpse of Skydance New Media and Hennig's "Marvel ensemble" game. Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    Proton 7.0-4 Released For Steam Play With Many Game Fixes, More Playable Titles
    Valve has just released Proton 7.0-4 as their newest downstream of Wine that powers Steam Play for enjoying many Windows games on Linux with great success for the Linux desktop, the Steam Deck, and more...  ( 4 min )
    AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO 5965WX Memory Scaling Benchmarks On Linux
    For those weighing whether to pursue the full eight memory channel configuration for the new Ryzen Threadripper 5000 series or starting out with just four or six memory modules, here are some reference benchmarks across four, six, and eight memory channels with the AMD Ryzen Threadripper PRO 5965WX 24-core processor while running Ubuntu Linux.  ( 4 min )
    Microsoft + Canonical Announce Native .NET 6 For Ubuntu 22.04 LTS
    The latest partnership between Microsoft and Canonical is an announcement today of native .NET availability for Ubuntu 22.04 LTS hosts as well as containers...  ( 4 min )
    AMD CPU Microcode Loading On Linux Being Fixed Up To Be Per-Thread
    Up to this point loading updated CPU microcode on AMD processors under Linux has checked just to ensure every physical CPU core was loaded with the new microcode but not sibling threads for SMT processors. While logically that makes sense, it turns out some AMD microcode updates do carry out per-thread modifications that means the microcode updating needs to be carried out on every thread. A Linux fix is on its way to the kernel to adjust that behavior...  ( 5 min )
    NVIDIA Ampere GA103 Support For Nouveau Being Sent In For Linux 6.0
    As part of today's "drm-misc-fixes" pull request, NVIDIA Ampere GA103 GPU support is set to be added to the Nouveau DRM driver with Linux 6.0...  ( 5 min )
    Real-Time "PREEMPT_RT" Work Down To Just 50 Patches Atop Linux 6.0-rc1
    Following Sunday's release of Linux 6.0-rc1, yesterday saw the release of 6.0-rc1-rt1 as the set of patches for providing real-time kernel support atop the upstream code-base. There is just roughly 50 patches to go until the PREEMPT_RT functionality is mainlined!..  ( 5 min )
    OpenSUSE Developers Continue Discussing x86_64 Microarchitecture Feature Levels
    Ahead of the upcoming openSUSE/SUSE Adaptable Linux Platform (ALP), whether to raise the x86_64 micro-architecture feature level required by the Linux OS continues to be evaluated and what options there are for making use of newer x86_64 instruction set extensions without necessarily forcing tightened CPU requirements / eliminating old hardware support...  ( 5 min )
    Lenovo Yoga C630 Snapdragon Laptop Seeing Fresh Linux Improvements
    When it comes to Linux on Arm laptops the recent excitement has been around the Asahi Linux porting work for the Apple M2 MacBooks and Linux 6.0 supporting the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8cx Gen3 and the flagship Lenovo ThinkPad X13s Arm laptop. Launched a few years ago though was the Lenovo Yoga C630 powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 850 and thanks now to the work of Linaro that older Arm laptop is seeing Linux support improvements...  ( 5 min )
    LZ4 v1.9.4 Achieves 20~70% Speedups For Some CPUs & Configurations
    LZ4 v1.9.4 is out today as the first point release in nearly two years for this BSD-licensed, speedy, lossless compression algorithm...  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Mordhaus medeltida slagsmål är på väg till konsol
    Efter tre års exklusivitet på pc.  ( 6 min )
    Squirrel with a Gun är precis vad det låter som
    Livsfarligt och urgulligt på samma gång.  ( 6 min )
    Wave Race 64 är nästa spel att släppas till Nintendo Switch Online
    Så länge man äger dess "Expansion Pack".  ( 6 min )
    FZ Play - Wakkaah spelar Multiversus och tävlar ut bonuskoder!
    Kändisslagsmål i kvällens stream.  ( 6 min )
    I Grounded kan spelarna dela världar med varandra
    Efterlängtad online-funktion presenterad.  ( 6 min )
    I Grounded kan spelarna delar världar med varandra
    Efterlängtad online-funktion presenterad.  ( 6 min )
    Guild Wars 2 släpps på Steam nästa vecka
    MMORPG-klassikern fyller 10 år.  ( 7 min )
    Fans samlas för att buggstäda Starfield - trots att det inte har releasedatum
    Lågt förtroende för Bethesda och spelmotorn.  ( 7 min )
    Uncharted-Amys Marvel-spel visas i september
    Spelnyheter från Marvel och Disney visas om drygt tre veckor.  ( 6 min )
    Försenad leverans: Deliver Us Mars skjuts upp till nästa år
    Uppföljaren till Deliver Us the Moon får vänta.  ( 6 min )
    Se gameplay från den tillfixade versionen av den totalsågade XIII-remaken
    Har de lyckats rädda hafsverket?  ( 6 min )
    Playstation-video sammanfattar handlingen i God of War inför Ragnarök
    Om man inte har tid med en genomspelning innan november.  ( 6 min )
    Effektstudion Weta jobbar på ett Sagan om Ringen-spel
    I samarbete med Private Division.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Snabbtest: Grafikprestanda i Marvel's Spider‑Man Remastered
    Spindelmannen svingar sig över från Playstation till PC i ett av de senaste årens mest hyllade actionspel. Calle sparkar igång redaktionens testrigg för ett snabbt prestandatest.  ( 11 min )
    AMD avtäcker Ryzen 7000 den 30 augusti
    AMD tar bladet från munnen och bekräftar det officiella datumet för avtäckandet av processorerna i Ryzen 7000-serien, där dessa ska presenteras under ett livesänt evenemang.  ( 5 min )
    Android 13 släppt skarpt
    Efter månader av utvecklarversioner och betatest har Google nu släppt Android 13 skarpt till Pixel-telefoner.  ( 5 min )
    AMD uppges försena lanseringen av Ryzen 7000
    Mitten av september blir slutet av september när det röda laget påstås vilja krascha Intels avtäckande av Core 13000-seriens processorer.  ( 6 min )
    AMD ryktas försena lanseringen av Ryzen 7000
    Mitten av september blir slutet av september när det röda laget sägs vilja krascha Intels avtäckande av Core 13000-seriens processorer.  ( 6 min )
    Snabbkoll: Är du en kabelhoarder?
    Kabellådan™ är den ökända lådan där alla äldre kablar från elektronisk utrustning av olika slag hamnar då kablarna kanske kan komma till användning i framtiden. Men oftast inte. Hur ser hoarderläget ut hos dig?  ( 5 min )
    Samsung Odyssey Ark är böjd jätteskärm med extra allt
    Ljusstark panel, hög upplösning, vertikalt läge och en kraftig krökning är några av egenskaperna som Samsung lyfter fram hos det påkostade flaggskeppet.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

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    No content preview  ( 2 min )
  • Open

    Bits from Debian: Debian turns 29!
    Today is Debian's 29th anniversary. We recently wrote about some ideas to celebrate the DebianDay, and several events have been planned in more than 14 locations. You can join the party or organise something yourselves too! Today is also an opportunity for you to start or resume your contributions to Debian. For example, you can have a look at our list of Debian Teams, install the how-can-i-help package and see if there is a bug in any of the software that you use that you can help to fix, start designing your artwork candidate for the next release, contribute small tips on how to install Debian on your machines to our wiki pages https://wiki.debian.org/InstallingDebianOn/, or put a Debian live image in an USB memory and give it to some person near you, who still didn't discover Debian. Our favorite operating system is the result of all the work we do together. Thanks to everybody who has contributed in these 29 years, and happy birthday Debian!  ( 2 min )
  • Open

    Marktext is an Excellent Editor Even for Those Who Don’t Know Markdown
    I have experimented with a number of markdown editors and there are plenty of good ones there. However, I took an instant liking to Marktext. Here's why!  ( 25 min )
  • Open

    Comic for 2022.08.16 - What Do You See
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 5 min )

  • Open

    Warning: Apple could be trying to cripple Jamf
    Tech watchdog group worries iGiant will 'Sherlock' device manager Apple is preparing to compete unfairly against enterprise device management firm Jamf, an advocacy group claimed on Monday, and has asked regulators to take a stand.…  ( 6 min )
    Sony camera feature hopes to make digital images immune to secret manipulation
    Cryptographically signs pics – but you'll pay $2,500 before you've bought a lens Sony has announced a new camera feature that the electronics goliath claims will make digital images immune to secret manipulation and forgery.…  ( 5 min )
    CIA accused of illegally spying on Americans visiting Assange in embassy
    Lawyers, journalists sue super-snoop agency and Spanish security biz The CIA illegally spied on US citizens while they visited WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange inside the Ecuadorian embassy in London, a lawsuit filed today has claimed.…  ( 5 min )
    Artemis I will get 3 launch attempts after termination system extension agreed
    Rolling back to the pad tomorrow, the SLS might finally take flight in August NASA's huge Space Launch System (SLS) will get its three launch attempts in the coming weeks after officials approved an extension to validation of the Flight Termination System from 20 to 25 days.…  ( 4 min )
    Dutch authorities arrest 29-year-old dev with suspected ties to Tornado Cash
    The arrest comes days after US Treasury levies sanctions against the crypto mixing service Dutch authorities have arrested a software developer suspected of working with Tornado Cash, a cryptocurrency mixing service that only two days earlier was sanctioned by the US government for allegedly laundering money for ransomware operators and other cybercriminals.…  ( 5 min )
    US bans export of tech used in 3nm chip production on security grounds
    Not mentioned: China. Obvious target: China – even if the country hasn't designed advanced chips The United States is formally banning the export of four technologies tied to semiconductor manufacturing, calling the protection of the items "vital to national security." …  ( 4 min )
    More datacenters coming to Ireland, despite energy concerns
    South Dublin County Council ban on buildouts set to be overturned by government Trouble is brewing in Ireland as a ban on datacenter buildouts in the Dublin area has reportedly been challenged by one developer, while Amazon has now been granted permission for two new facilities near the city amid growing concern over the amount of energy bit barns consume.…  ( 4 min )
    Microsoft's Secure Boot fix sends some PCs into BitLocker Recovery
    Have your BitLocker key handy when updating, but maybe not on a Post-it stuck to the screen, OK? Windows users are reporting BitLocker problems after installing last week's security update for Secure Boot.…  ( 4 min )
    US CHIPS Act: Getting the funding is just the start
    Plan to regain semiconductor production market share may be a case of too little, too late Analysis  The long-awaited US CHIPS Act has finally been signed into law by President Biden, unlocking $52 billion in funding to boost the American semiconductor industry as a part of the broader $280 billion CHIPS and Science Act. Now the industry has to make good on its promises in a market where inflation is rapidly stifling demand.…  ( 7 min )
    Intel hands over nearly 5,000 patents in deal with IP management outfit
    Newly formed Tahoe Research Limited will seek to license them to third parties Intel has entered into an agreement with IPValue Management Group that sees nearly 5,000 patents transferred to a newly formed company within the group that will seek to license them to third parties.…  ( 5 min )
    Epson says ink pad saturation behind 'end of service life' warning on inkjet printers
    Directs customers to Maintenance Reset Utility so they can continue to print Epson has clarified the dread "end of service life" inkjet printer warning with an updated support page directing users to its Maintenance Reset Utility after critics complained about repairability.…  ( 3 min )
    Virgin Orbit trims losses, eyes two final launches for the year
    Second quarter revenues at zero, though should jump to $12m following successful flights from Cornwall Virgin Orbit is burning less money, although it won't be launching quite as many rockets as originally hoped.…  ( 4 min )
    When will the UK take another giant leap into space?
    Tim Peake set to return to ESA as the race to first vertical launch from British soil continues Feature  It promises to be a busy few years for British spaceflight. Astronaut Tim Peake is due to return to the European Space Agency (ESA) and the UK's first vertical launches are set to take place in Scotland.…  ( 5 min )
    Nuclear power is the climate superhero too nervous to wear its cape
    Of all the non-carbon energy options we have, this is the only one which can keep the lights on Opinion  What's GIF got to do with nuclear reactors? Commercial development of atomic power plants had largely stopped by the 1980s; even so you could do better than Deluxe Paint for your blueprints. Yet the connection is much more modern, to do with projects like the revival of molten salt tech as a new hope for zero-emission power.…  ( 6 min )
    Keep your cables tidy. You never know when someone might need some wine
    Brute force and ignorance does not win the day Who, Me?  We've all heard the one about the cleaner in the hospital pulling the wrong plug. But managing to push back the schedule by months through sheer brute force? Welcome to Who, Me?…  ( 4 min )
    China's internet regulator details algorithms used by local Big Tech players
    Beijing lifts the lid on how Alibaba, Douyin, Tencent, Baidu do business – and censor content Beijing's internet regulator, the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC), has released information about the algorithms that some of the nation's biggest tech companies use to make their services work.…  ( 4 min )
    Samsung heir pardoned after doing time for bribery
    Government said they need the Samsung boss back at work to deal with South Korea’s looming economic crisis South Korean president Yoon Suk Yeol issued a widely anticipated pardon for Samsung heir and vice chairman Lee Jae-yong that came into effect today.…  ( 4 min )
    Indian military ready to put long-range quantum key distribution on the line
    Local startup can make it happen over 150km India's military has celebrated the nation's Independence Day by announcing it will adopt locally developed quantum key distribution (QKD)technology that can operate across distances of 150km.…  ( 4 min )
    Apple says 2017 MacBooks don't have FlexGate defect. Aussie tribunal orders a fix anyway
    Presiding officer was not impressed by Cupertino's arguments or behavior Apple has been ordered to repair a MacBook Pro that displays all the symptoms of FlexGate – the syndrome of screen defects that the company has previously repaired for free – but which the company does not believe has the problem.…  ( 6 min )
    Black Hat and DEF CON visitors differ on physical risk management
    COVID, flood surfing, crowds – what to pick? Black Hat  As last week's hacker summer camps would down it's clear that attendee numbers are still well down on the pre-COVID days, although things are recovering.…  ( 4 min )
    Linux 6.0 debuts, missing some Rusty bits and a magic mushroom reference
    Don't read the diffstat too closely, says Linus Torvalds – it's mostly another massive AMD update Emperor Penguin Linus Torvalds has released the first release candidate for Linux 6.0, but doesn't mind what you call it.…  ( 4 min )
    Elon Musk wrote article for China's internet regulator, hinted at aged care robots
    PLUS Vietnam's massive infosec push; Philippines telco fight; Australia dumps COVID app; and more Asia in Brief  Elon Musk has written an article for the Cyberspace Administration of China's flagship magazine.…  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    This RTX 3090 Ti is under £1200, some £691 below its UK RRP
    The RTX 3090 Ti is the fastest consumer graphics card Nvidia has ever made - but the rumoured imminent arrival of their RTX 4090 graphics card means that it's now going for nearly £700 below its original £1879 UK RRP. In fact, you can now pick up one of these graphics cards for less than £1200, just £100 more than the launch price of the RTX 2080 Ti for around 75% more performance. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Razer's excellent Huntsman Mini Analog keyboard is just £98 today
    The Razer Huntsman Mini Analog is one of a vanishingly small number of keyboards with analogue switches, meaning each key knows exactly how far down it's being pressed. That unlocks the door to some unique capabilities, from adjusting the sensitivity of the keyboard on the fly to using the WASD keys as a thumbstick replacement in racing games. It's also just a damn fine mechanical keyboard, with a comfortable 60% size, bright RGB lighting and premium PBT keycaps. You normally pay a lot for this kind of quality and functionality - £150, in fact - but today the keyboard has dropped to its lowest ever price of £97.94 over at Amazon UK. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Can turn-based cyberpunk RPG Keylocker unlock its true musical potential?
    Keylocker is all about the rhythm. If you’re escaping a dystopian prison system where you can pay to upgrade to invisible handcuffs, your escape may as well have a jamming soundtrack. But you'll have to bring your own, because the world in Keylocker hates that stuff. Like in Footloose, music is an illegal activity. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Sci-fi sequel Deliver Us Mars delayed until 2023
    Sci-fi puzzle adventure Deliver Us Mars has seen its launch window moved from September to next February. Devs KeokeN Interactive put out a statement crediting the delay to ensuring the game is “the best it can be”. The game was first revealed back in March, and then announced for a 2022 release in June. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Vikings On Trampolines is the next game from the Owlboy team
    Vikings aren’t really known for their acrobatic prowess but Owlboy developers D-Pad Studio are limbering up for their next indie game, Vikings On Trampolines. It’s based on an award-winning experimental game the team produced back in 2011. Witness the sheer Nordic bounciness in the trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Doom can now run on a jailbroken tractor
    The greatest legacy left by humanity for alien archaeologists to find in the aeons to come will be millions of random devices running id Software’s pioneering FPS Doom. The latest such piece of kit is the display from a John Deere tractor, jailbroken and fragging away at demons at this past weekend’s DEF CON hacking conference in Las Vegas. The tractor computer was hacked by Sick Codes, who’s trying to draw attention to farming equipment manufacturers who lock down their products to prevent owners from repairing them. Read more  ( 16 min )
    In Mindhack you can literally change criminal minds. But should you?
    Mindhack, an upcoming visual novel adventure, opens in a jail cell, as a criminal named Unid is brought before you by a pair of armed security guards. Your reputation precedes you: before the accused can even sit down, they call out your unusual ability to hack into the minds of people to ‘patch’ their flaws, turning their nefarious intentions into fields of flowers. But it’s ok, isn’t it? After all, the person in front of you has committed a crime and must be rehabilitated; reckless driving, hit and run, and arson. So, you get to work. Talking to Unid allows you to build a rapport and understand their motivations. You learn about their past. They talk of their difficult childhood, pets, a lack of support - broken systems that left them behind and put them on their current path. It doesn’t matter. You have a job to do. And now, with that bit of knowledge, you’ve found the 'bug' in their programming. After initiating a hack on their brain, you eradicate this flaw, forcefully transforming their mind into a paradise of purity. Unid will never commit another crime again. Have you done the right thing? Read more  ( 17 min )
    Screenshot Saturday Mondays: swashbuckling chandelier murder
    Every weekend, indie devs show off current work on Twitter's #screenshotsaturday tag. And every Monday, I bring you a selection of these snaps and clips. This weekend, my eye was caught by swashbuckling chandelier murder, a bumpy train ride, and lots of good colours. Come see! Read more  ( 17 min )
    Genshin Impact's 3.0 update takes us to the dreamless region of Sumeru in August
    Free-to-play open world ARPG Genshin Impact updates to version 3.0 on August 24th, developers HoYoverse have revealed. The update is rather fancily called The Morn A Thousand Roses Brings, and introduces the new ley-line-filled Sumeru region. You can scout ahead by watching the extremely dramatic trailer below. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Your troupe of brawling, eccentric performers packs a wallop in Circus Electrique
    Instead of commanding a group of rugged, blood-soaked mercenaries on a turn-based death crawl through unimaginable horrors, how about a neo-Victorian circus troupe brawling with biomechatronic Londoners? That's Circus Electrique, a turn-based RPG that's much more lighthearted than its Darkest Dungeon counterpart (and seemingly main inspiration). But after playing a preview of the game’s first mission, there's more than meets the eye in this part steampunk RPG, part circus tycoon management sim. You play as Amelia, a young, bold journalist returning to London to cover the grand re-opening of the Circus Electrique. A metaphorical spanner gets lobbed into the works, however, as the ceremony is interrupted with news that London’s citizens have started attacking each other (more than your average fisticuffs to get on the tube). Oddly, this doesn’t seem to have affected Amelia and your motley circus troupe, who venture out into London’s dangerous streets to find answers. Read more  ( 19 min )
    DC antihero Black Adam and Gremlins bad boy Stripe are coming to MultiVersus
    Franchise mash-up brawler MultiVersus slams into season one today, despite only recently being postponed indefinitely. Although nothing has been announced yet, it appears that DC Comics supervillain Black Adam and Gremlins antagonist Stripe are new characters being teased for the game’s roster of fighters. Players are sharing screenshots and footage of ads for MultiVersus that show off the gruesome twosome. Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    1,900 Signal users’ phone numbers exposed by Twilio phishing
    No message, profile, or other data exposed—but SMS remains a weakness.  ( 5 min )
    Scientists bent frickin’ laser beams to create this detailed image of a cat
    "We can use this system to do quantum simulations of electrons and superconductivity."  ( 6 min )
    Apple ad exec wants to more than double ad revenue with new ads across iOS
    Apple's ads business has been a stop-and-go affair, but it's ready to go again.  ( 5 min )
    Google Maps accused of leading users to fake abortion clinics
    Advertisers have to verify abortion services, but not businesses, on Google Maps.  ( 6 min )
    Intel turns to code translation to run old DirectX9 games on its newest GPUs
    DirectX9 is still in relatively wide use, given that it's 20 years old.  ( 5 min )
    No, seriously, NASA’s Space Launch System is ready to take flight
    The rocket may launch just two weeks from now.  ( 5 min )
    California to consider keeping last nuclear plant open
    Move would help it meet its carbon emissions plans.  ( 6 min )
    Rebuilding a once-great racing name: The return of Lola Cars
    Lola built some of the best racing cars in the world but went bust in 2012.  ( 6 min )
    Google ships Android 13 to Pixels; adds customization options, spatial audio
    Not a massive overhaul, but it adds Material You features, Bluetooth LE Audio, & more.  ( 5 min )
    Update Zoom for Mac now to avoid root-access vulnerability
    Feature you'd normally want for secure software opened a huge hole.  ( 5 min )
    NFL Blitz arcade games will relaunch as Arcade1Up cabinet exclusive
    Three-game collection for $599 will have some unfortunate edits.  ( 6 min )
    Stacey Morgan recounts hitting “the wall” during her husband’s spaceflight
    "He isn't pale; he is gray. He doesn't look tired; he looks ancient."  ( 6 min )
    Machine learning, concluded: Did the “no-code” tools beat manual analysis?
    In the finale of our experiment, we look at how the low/no-code tools performed.  ( 6 min )
    A new jailbreak for John Deere tractors rides the right-to-repair wave
    Exploit now provides root access to two popular models of the company’s farm equipment.  ( 6 min )
    Bacteria fight off viruses with a protein like one of ours
    Eukaryotes, archaea, and bacteria share a set of proteins that block many viruses.  ( 7 min )
  • Open

    Qualcomm Posts "QAIC" DRM Accelerator Driver For Linux
    After Qualcomm announced their Cloud AI 100 Accelerator back in 2019, in 2020 during the early days of the pandemic they posted a Linux driver for this accelerator. That driver didn't get picked up for the mainline Linux kernel and two years later there still is little fanfare around the Qualcomm AI Cloud Accelerator hardware. However, now they have posted a new Linux driver that goes the DRM driver route...  ( 5 min )
    Android 13 Sources Released To AOSP
    Google announced today that the Android 13 sources have been published to the Android Open-Source Project as part of officially releasing this newest version of Android...  ( 4 min )
    GNOME 43 Beta Released With More GTK 4 Porting, Other Desktop Improvements
    The beta of GNOME 43 is now available for testing ahead of the stable release next month...  ( 5 min )
    Linux 6.0 Supporting New Intel/AMD Hardware, Performance Improvements & Much More
    Yesterday marked the release of Linux 6.0-rc1 and as such the merge window is no over and no more feature work is set to land in this kernel version. Here is my write-up of all the interesting new features and changes/improvements coming for Linux 6.0.  ( 6 min )
    Greg KH Recommends Avoiding Alder Lake Laptops - Intel Webcam Linux Driver Long Ways Out
    Greg Kroah-Hartman as the Linux kernel's stable maintainer and effectively Linus Torvalds' second-in-command has suggested avoiding Intel Alder Lake laptops. While much of the Alder Lake laptop support for Linux is in good shape, the exception is around web cameras. These newer laptops with Intel's latest web-camera tech are not currently supported by the mainline kernel and require proprietary software for use. Some platforms like Ubuntu and ChromeOS are picking up these blobs for now while a proper open-source, upstream solution is likely months -- or likely about one year -- away...  ( 6 min )
    AMD P-State Patches Updated But Miss The Linux 6.0 Merge Window
    AMD today sent out revised patches for improving the AMD P-State CPU frequency scaling Linux driver that aims to provide better power efficiency than the generic ACPI CPUFreq driver that has long been relied upon for AMD processors...  ( 5 min )
    Intel's oneAPI Support Appears To Be In Good Shape For Blender 3.3
    Less than one month away is the release of Blender 3.3 and it looks like Intel's initial oneAPI GPU acceleration is ready and in decent shape for Windows and Linux...  ( 5 min )
    MGLRU v14 Released For Improving Linux Low-Memory Performance
    While Linux 6.0 will bring a lot of shiny new features, Multi-Gen LRU (MGLRU) is one of the anticipated changes that isn't going to land now until Linux 6.1. But in the interim, MGLRU v14 was posted today that re-bases the code against 6.0-rc1 to help facilitate more testing of this kernel change that primarily helps Linux systems under memory pressure...  ( 5 min )
    Linux 6.0-rc1 Released With Exciting Performance Optimizations, New Hardware Support
    After the two week long merge window, Linus Torvalds this afternoon released the first release candidate of Linux 6.0. Over the next roughly two months the Linux 6.0 kernel will stabilize but already from my early testing on various systems it is in nice shape and the features and performance are looking great...  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    How to Transfer a Windows 10 or 11 License to Another PC
    If you're building a new PC, you may be able to use an old Windows key for its OS.  ( 62 min )
    Alder Lake Laptop Webcam Support in Linux is Super Shaky
    A Linux expert has reported that Alder Lake laptops sporting the MIPI IPU6 are suffering from Linux compatibility issues surrounding proprietary drivers. Full open source drivers are a long way away.  ( 59 min )
    Hinged, Dual-Screen Display Coming Soon with Touch Option
    Appeals to potential customers to “save your neck and your desk space,” by opting for this decidedly different dual-24-inch clamshell display on a stand.  ( 60 min )
    New Linux Build Runs Nintendo Switch Games on Arm64 Devices
    The developer decided to go public with this Switch-fan OS work now that the milestone of the first playable commercial game title has been reached.  ( 60 min )
    Nvidia Reportedly Resuming RTX 3080 12GB Production, Thanks To GA102 Over Supply
    Nvidia has reportedly restarted production on its RTX 3080 12GB SKU, as a result of oversupply issues surrounding its GA102 die.  ( 59 min )
    Tiny, 4-Inch Motherboard Can Run a Xeon W Workstation CPU
    A tiny embedded system that supports a range of Intel processors.  ( 62 min )
    Asus ROG Chakram X Review: Gaming Mouse Potential, Squandered
    The Asus ROG Chakram X is a stunning example of a gaming mouse, but has some major issues that should deter just about anyone.  ( 64 min )
  • Open

    GNOME Celebrates 25th Anniversary with Beta Release of Upcoming GNOME 43 Desktop
    GNOME 43 Beta is now available for public testing ahead of the September 21st, 2022, release of the GNOME 43 desktop environment series. Here's what's new since last month's GNOME 43 Alpha release. The post GNOME Celebrates 25th Anniversary with Beta Release of Upcoming GNOME 43 Desktop appeared first on 9to5Linux - do not reproduce this article without permission. This RSS feed is intended for readers, not scrapers.  ( 38 min )
  • Open

    Senaste Gotham Knights-trailern ger oss en titt på Red Hood
    Gothams svar på Rödluvan visar var skåpet ska stå.  ( 6 min )
    Bärbar bilkross: Wreckfest är på väg till mobiler
    Och det är Handygames som tar hand om denna version.  ( 6 min )
    Spider-Man är Playstations näst största Steam-släpp
    Antalet samtidiga spelare var något högre för God of War.  ( 6 min )
    Smiska Wakkaah i Multiversus - vinn boosterkod!
    I tisdagens FZ Play-stream.  ( 6 min )
    Urgamla Ashen Empires skulle släppts på Steam, men... försenas
    Spelet som får WoW: Classic att kännas nytt.  ( 6 min )
    Gratis-PUBG verkar ha varit ett lyft för utgivaren
    ”80 000 nya spelare om dagen”.  ( 6 min )
    Se alla trailers från THQ Digital Showcase
    Skräck, gotik och mycket annat.  ( 9 min )
    Xbox One sålde "mindre än hälften så många enheter som Playstation 4"
    Domstolsdokument bekräftar.  ( 7 min )
    Gothic-remaken ser betydligt bättre ut än demon i nya trailern
    Ta en tur till lägret och ner i gruvorna.  ( 6 min )
    Wreckreation blandar galen racing med galnare banbyggande
    Skapat av gamnla Burnout-utvecklare.  ( 6 min )
    Tempest Rising är realtidsstrategi av den gamla skolan
    Med starka C&C-vibbar.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Even more Steam Deck purchase invites are going out from now
    Valve has confirmed that they are (again) increasing the amount of people that will be invited to purchase a Steam Deck.  ( 4 min )
    Tempest Rising looks like the RTS I've been waiting for
    THQ Nordic, 3D Realms and Slipgate Ironworks recently revealed Tempest Rising an upcoming classic RTS and after watching the trailer I absolutely need this.  ( 4 min )
    Avorion - Into The Rift is an expansive DLC out now for this great space sim
    Probably one of the best spaceship building sandbox games around, Avorion has just grown tremendously with the Into The Rift DLC out now.  ( 4 min )
    Tim Burton inspired adventure game Whateverland launches September 15
    Following from the successful Kickstarter campaign in 2020, Caligari Games have announced their Burton-style point and click adventure will release on September 15.  ( 4 min )
    Kitsune Zero, prequel to upcoming LGBTQ+ platformer Kitsune Tails, releases September 12
    Kitsune Zero is being releases on September 12 as a paid DLC for the free platformer Super Bernie World. This will act as a prequel to the upcoming standalone game Kitsune Tails.  ( 4 min )
    Wine compatibly layer manager Bottles adds vkBasalt improvements, vmtouch cache
    Bottles is easily the most simple way to manage installing and running Windows games and apps on Linux outside of Steam. A new release is out now with plenty of useful tweaks.  ( 4 min )
    The first point-release for Ubuntu 22.04 LTS is now available
    Canonical announced the release of Ubuntu 22.04.1 LTS which brings together an updated download with all the bug fixes, updated apps, driver upgrades and more.  ( 4 min )
    Heroic Games Launcher v2.4.0 is out with GOG Cloud Save support
    Heroic Games Launcher enables you to download games on Linux and Steam Deck from both the Epic Store and GOG. A big new release is out now with some massive new features.  ( 4 min )
    Easy Anti-Cheat not working on Linux? Seems a glibc update broke it
    News has been doing the rounds for a little bit about Easy Anti-Cheat (EAC) suddenly not working after system updates for some users, turns out it's an issue with glibc.  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Jonathan Dowland: Temperature monitoring
    Xiaomi Mijia Temperature Sensor I've been having some temperature problems in my house, so I wanted to set up some thermometers which I could read from a computer, and look at trends. I bought a pack of three cheap Xiaomi IoT thermometers. There's some official Xiaomi tooling to access them from smartphones and suchlike, but I wanted something more open. The thermometers have some rudimentary security on them to try and ensure you use the official tooling. This is pretty weak, and the open-source Home Assistant (HA) has support for querying them. I wasn't already running HA and it looked to do more than I needed right now. gathering A friend told me that it was trivial to write custom firmware to the devices. It's so easy you can do it from a web-based flasher: in fact, anyone in range can…  ( 2 min )
    John Goerzen: The Joy of Easy Personal Radio: FRS, GMRS, and Motorola DLR/DTR
    Most of us carry cell phones with us almost everywhere we go. So much so that we often forget not just the usefulness, but even the joy, of having our own radios. For instance: When traveling to national parks or other wilderness areas, family and friends can keep in touch even where there is no cell coverage. It is a lot faster to just push a button and start talking than it is to unlock a phone, open the phone app, select a person, wait for the call to connect, wait for the other person to answer, etc. “I’m heading back.” “OK.” Boom, 5 seconds, done. A phone user wouldn’t have even dialed in that time. A whole group of people can be on the same channel. You can often buy a radio for less than the monthly cost of a cell plan. From my own experience, as a person and a family that enj…
  • Open

    Turns out Xbox One sales were less than half of the PS4's, says Microsoft itself
    In 2016 Microsoft stopped reporting sales figures of the Xbox One, but recent documents from the company have confirmed how little the console sold compared to the PS4. If you remember the early days of the Xbox One, they were a bit of a disaster due to some poor early decisions (that were admittedly quite quickly backtracked), and three years after its release in 2016 Microsoft stopped reporting sales figures. But now as reported by The Verge, in some documents filed to Brazil's national competition regulator, Microsoft has admitted Xbox One sales figures were less than half of the PS4. "Sony has surpassed Microsoft in terms of console sales and installed base, having sold more than twice as many Xbox in the last generation," said Microsoft, as translated from Portuguese by The Verge. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Surprise! Anime characters and Hitler dominate Tower of Fantasy's create-a-character library
    Tower of Fantasy has been popping off in a major way since its launch last week, with the character creation standing out as a major plus for the waves of oncoming gamers exploring the world. Some of the more creatively-minded out there have even uploaded their customised looks to the in-game character lobby, which lets you dress up as well-known characters like Sasuke from Naruto, Jellal from Fairy Tail, and… Adolf Hiter. As it stands right now, Hitler (we could be nice and say Charlie Chaplin) is among some of the most popular preset characters in the game. They’re currently ranked 13th among male characters and 41st overall at 5,209 favourites. This puts them above 2B from Nier Automata, Naruto, and Tanjiro from Demon Slayer. What this means is that right now you at home — yes, you — can take on the world as arguably the world’s most evil man. I actually saw Hitler out in the wild in Tower of Fantasy. I sat and watched as he struggled to throw a water core at a Chowchow plant for around 3 minutes before storming off and fending off some hyenas. Let me tell you, you’ve not played Tower of Fantasy until you’ve seen the leader of the Third Reich do aerial combos in frozen time. Read more  ( 16 min )
    If Gollum and The Rings Of Power isn't enough, there’s a new Lord of the Rings game coming from Weta Workshop
    Lord of the Rings fans should be happy, as Wētā Workshop is officially working on a new game set in the Middle-earth universe. Private Division announced the news today (August 15) and will be on publishing duties for the as-of-yet unnamed title. Last year, a job ad for a producer role at Wētā Workshop was advertised, which was supposed to be for a new project based on a "major worldwide IP." It seems like that IP is in fact Lord of the Rings, which makes a lot of sense considering the studio literally worked on the effects of the original films. The press release noted that the game is still in "early development," and doesn't currently have a release date, but is apparently expected to launch during Take Two's Fiscal year 2024. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Spider-Man PC files reveal that co-op and PvP were once being developed
    One curious player has dived into the PC files for Spider-Man Remastered, and sure enough, they found something interesting. The interesting bit being that Spider-Man very well could've featured co-op and PvP elements in an alternate universe. Twitter user, DniweTamp, shared screenshots of what they'd found in the game files, and they reveal that co-op and PvP were once in development for the superhero title. The screenshots have also since been checked and verified by VGC. The information comes directly from the games executable files and shows that multiplayer mode would've included callouts to 'the Superior Spider Man' alongside a winner message. It also appears the two characters would've stepped into the shoes of either Miles Morales or Peter Parker for the rumble. Read more  ( 16 min )
    God of War's story recap reminds you why everyone’s so excited about this year’s biggest PlayStation game
    If it's been a while since you've played 2018's God of War, you're in luck, as PlayStation has created a very convenient recap video. With the amount of games there are to get through practically on a daily basis, it would be pretty understandable if the story of the practically ancient (four years counts as ancient) God of War didn't manage to stick around in your head for too long. Thankfully, over on the PlayStation blog we've been gifted with a recap, paired with a Myths of Midgard video narrated by actress Felicia Day. The blog post is pretty much your standard recap affair. It reminds you who Krato is, if you managed to forget, and his son, Atreus, also known as capital B Boy. To go along with the important plot beats, you've got some screenshots that help visualise everything, but the better way to refamiliarise yourself with the story is the video. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Gremlins' Stripe and Black Adam are probably coming to MultiVersus
    A new MultiVersus leak appears to have revealed that someone fed a Mogwai after midnight (also Black Adam is there). After a short delay, MultiVersus Season One launches later today, and soon enough the game will see the arrival of Morty of Rick and Morty fame. But it also seems that some more characters that haven't had an official reveal yet were accidentally shown off early, as reported by Eurogamer. Game director Tony Huynh shared yesterday (August 14) that players could expect to see some unannounced characters in the login screen today (August 15), presumably once Season One launched, but an ad on the Xbox store has gone live a little bit early. Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    The Pokémon Company International pledges global donations to organisations supporting children
    The Pokémon Company International has announced its commitment to global organisations in support of children and minority groups. A subsidiary of The Pokémon Company, The Pokémon Company International is responsible for the Pokémon brand in all regions other than Asia. As the Pokémon series has hit 25 years since its first game was released (Pokémon Red and Blue in 1996), the company has pledged to donate at least $25 million over five years to organisations across the world dedicated to "improving the lives of children and supporting social equity". Read more  ( 15 min )
    FIFA 23 transforms footballers into Marvel superheroes for Ultimate Team
    Here's an odd crossover: FIFA and Marvel. EA has announced a collaboration with Marvel that reimagines some of the most famous footballers of yesteryear as superheroes. Ex-footballers such as USA stalwart Landon Donovan, legendary Chelsea defender Ricardo Carvalho and all-conquering Man City midfielder Yaya Touré have unique illustrated designs that replace real-world player photos in FIFA 23's Ultimate Team mode. Read more  ( 15 min )
    DF Direct Weekly talks Spider-Man PC reviewing and PC gaming in an energy crisis
    Welcome the latest edition of DF Direct Weekly - Digital Foundry's regular show on the latest gaming and technology news. Perhaps not surprisingly, the lion's share of our news discussion this week concerns the release of Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered on PC. We've discussed the various trials we had in delivering our coverage - not least the arrival of a major (and welcome!) patch on embargo day. However, in this week's show, we talk about our discussions with Nixxes, remaining performance hurdles and the title's remarkable CPU burden, especially with ray tracing enabled. However, we also spend a fair amount of time talking about the rising cost of gaming - or more specifically, the huge increases in energy costs. In the UK at least, we're looking at a potentially gigantic and disastrous increase in the cost of electricity in October - and the recent news on next-gen GPUs raising their TDPs has got a lot of people concerned. First of all, I do think that the biggest TDP increases will be found on the more expensive GPUs, but ultimately, perhaps we should be looking at the energy savings brought about by frame-rate limiters. As we discuss in this week's show, you never really fully utilise a CPU - you buy a more expensive processor to mitigate against the worst case scenarios... so why not adopt the same strategy with a GPU too? I'm perfectly happy to play most triple-A fare at 90-100fps, effectively a 10-11ms render time per frame. Beyond that, my perception barely sees much difference - but the energy cost in running a GPU unlocked is significantly higher. So setting an arbitrary frame-rate cap that sits at the sweet spot of the game you're playing seems like a good idea to me, the idea being that your extra GPU performance is only deployed where needed in the service of a consistent experience. It'll be interesting to see if Nvidia, AMD or Intel consider some kind of energy efficiency mode - but of course, using DLSS or FSR 2.0 is also a big energy saver too. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Squirrel with a Gun promises a squirrel with a gun
    If there's anything that games have taught us over the past decade, it's that people want to play as animals. More specifically, we want to play as annoying little critters and get away with all sorts of things that real human life does not look kindly upon. Thankfully, indie developers have been paying attention to the success seen by previous games like Goat Simulator and Untitled Goose Game. Assignment understood. And I say that with confidence, and I'm about to show you why. Read more  ( 17 min )
    New God of War Ragnarök trailer will get you up to speed on the story so far
    PlayStation has unveiled a new trailer ahead of God of War Ragnarök's release. This trailer, titled Myths of Midgard, offers a brief summary of 2018's God of War epic. It stars Felicia Day, as she narrates the story of Kratos and Atreus so far. There are also little 'cameos' from know-it-all Mimir throughout the retelling, which is full of some really gorgeous artwork. You can check it out for yourself below. Read more  ( 15 min )
    New Lord of the Rings game on the way from Private Division and Weta
    A new Lord of the Rings game will be published by Private Division in collaboration with Weta Workshop. Details on the game itself are unknown, though it will be set in the Middle-earth universe of J.R.R. Tolkien's novels. Private Division is part of Take-Two Interactive and has previously published the likes of Kerbal Space Program, Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey, and Obsidian's The Outer Worlds. It's also set to publish new games from Ori and the Blind Forest's Moon Studios, OlliOlli creators Roll7, and Armello developer League of Geeks. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Dedicated Zelda: Breath of the Wild player shares impressive Yiga Clan discovery
    One extremely dedicated Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild player has gone the extra mile, and unearthed a little known exploit of the game's Yiga Clan. So, it turns out that those 'travellers' that litter Hyrule, but are in fact members of the Yiga Clan in disguise, are actually "evil twins" of other inhabitants found across the map. As documented by justlookingfordragon on Reddit, the 'disguises' used by the Yiga are "1:1 clones of other, properly named NPCs that exist somewhere" in the game's world. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Affogato makes the case for more witches owning coffee shops
    I learned about Affogato in a PR email I didn't read properly, and I thought it was about running a coffee shop. It is, sort of. You run a coffee shop, handle the grinds and the brewing and the little shakers of sugar. But you're also a witch. And you can dive inside the minds of your customers and solve problems by fighting cleverly framed battles. So you run a coffee shop and then some. The coffee shop stuff inevitably reminds me of Coffee Talk, and Affogato has captured the same evening setting, sparkling with all its urban promise. It's fun trying to make drinks properly, remembering the differences between them and mastering the intricacies of seasoning. But the game properly comes alive in the battles. Affogato calls this system a sort of reverse tower-defense, and it calls to mind another reverse tower-defense game that I haven't thought about in years: Anomaly: Warzone Earth. In Anomaly, you lead a convoy through a city laced with turrets and enemy rockets. Affogato zooms in a little: you play cards to place units upon a track that threads through a bunch of baddies. They attack you automatically and you attack them automatically. Early on - I've only played the demo - it's all about picking the route and defending yourself. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Iconic Wii Sports Mii Matt joins Switch Sports
    Matt, one of the most famous faces from Nintendo Wii Sports era, is now available in Switch Sports for those that are looking to up their game. "Interested in a tougher challenge in #NintendoSwitchSports," asked Nintendo. "Try entering ZR + R + A or ZL + L + → on the difficulty select screen." This text in itself wasn't enough to set the internet ablaze. However, the picture accompanying the news was. Why? Because it showed Matt with his new 'legend' title brandishing a baton ready to take on players (thanks, IGN). Read more  ( 15 min )
    FaZe Clan's Nickmercs promotes maskless event in wake of TwitchCon San Diego's mask mandate
    Last week Twitch updated its policy for its TwichCon San Diego event, making masks a requirement while indoors as well as proof of vaccination or a negative covid test. Many potential attendees were put off by the lack of safety measures, but following the policy update others are now refusing to attend due to the mask requirement. FaZe Clan is organising its own event in San Diego at the same time, and its co-owner Nickmercs has stated masks won't be required. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Spider-Man Remastered mods let you play as Miles Morales, Stan Lee and more
    Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered released three days ago on PC, and modders have been hard at work over the weekend. There are already several mods which reshade the game, like this one from BadRusMan that emulates a more cinematic style, or overhaul the visuals, like this noir mod by ManWithAPlan. There's also a mod which disables the HUD and enemy outlines, by Mixerced, if you want to remove the interface whilst you play. Read more  ( 15 min )
    God of War Ragnarök leak reveals Odin concept art
    Ahead of its November release, a new image showing off concept art for Odin from God of War Ragnarök made its way online over the weekend. This leak came from industry insider AestheticGamer, also known as Dusk Golem. "I'm just holding onto a bunch of misc God of War Ragnarok things right now, decided to only post concept art of Odin. All I'm going to post, and yes, Odin looks a lot different than I imagined too," they wrote before sharing the image and wishing everyone a good day. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Cyberpunk 2077 mod replicates Johnny Silverhand's TTRPG look
    A new mod for Cyberpunk 2077 allows players to change the design of Johnny Silverhand to match his appearance in the original TTRPG. Project 2020 from modder ErebusEquity, available on Nexus Mods, includes tabletop appearances, original looks, and multiple face swap and hair swap options, as spotted by TheGamer. Cyberpunk 2077 is based on the Cyberpunk 2020 TTRPG from 1988, but has Silverhand played by Keanu Reeves in a central role to the plot. Read more  ( 15 min )
    MultiVersus leak reveals Gremlin antagonist Stripe is coming to brawl
    A new leak for Warner Bros.' brawler MultiVersus has revealed that both Stripe from Gremlins and DC's Black Adam will be joining the battle roster. As revealed by _FireMonkey on Twitter, the twosome can be seen in the game's season one startup screen, which Warner Bros. set live a little too early. The company had originally said that upcoming fighters would be teased in MultiVersus' start up screen, but unfortunately the developer jumped the gun a bit on that one. The duo will join the likes of current characters such as Bugs Bunny, Batman and Arya Stark. Meanwhile, Morty of Rick and Morty fame will be joining the fray on 23rd August. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Spider-Man Remastered second biggest launch for PlayStation Studios on PC
    Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered is off to a great start on PC, but Cult of the Lamb isn't far behind. Insomniac's PlayStation exclusive released last week on PC and it already has the second highest concurrent peak on Steam for PlayStation Studios, behind God of War. Its all-time peak is 66,436 players, behind God of War's 73,529, making it the second biggest launch for the studio on PC. It's currently the number one top selling game on Steam. Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    Intel överger DirectX 9 – ska använda emulering
    Med händerna fulla med problem väljer Intel att inte längre stödja det äldre DirectX 9. Istället ska funktionaliteten bibehållas med hjälp av emulering.  ( 6 min )
    Microsoft: "Playstation 4 sålde dubbelt så bra som Xbox One"
    Efter att inte pratat om säljsiffror på flera år bekräftar Microsoft att Xbox One såldes i hälften så många exemplar som Playstation 4.  ( 6 min )
    Samsung 990 Pro med PCI Express 5.0 dyker upp i databas
    Till hösten väntas det koreanska bolaget släppa lös nästa generations SSD-enheter för konsumenter, där paradnumret är högre överföringshastigheter tack vare PCI Express 5.0.  ( 5 min )
    LG Display vill krympa OLED-monitor till 20 tum
    LG Display vill göra OLED-paneler tillgängliga i ännu fler storlekar och planerar att visa upp en OLED på 20 tum innan årets slut.  ( 6 min )
    Sommarens datorbygge har korats!
    SweClockers har talat! Sommarens tjusigaste bygge har röstats fram och det blev Vertikal av UnknownBum som kammade hem segern.  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Handling “apt-key is deprecated. Manage keyring files in trusted.gpg.d instead” in Ubuntu Linux
    The apt-key is being deprecated and your system knows that. But do you know what you should be doing for getting packages from external repositories?  ( 27 min )
  • Open

    Stuff
    stuff comic See also: Squires.nz | Instagram | Twitter The post Stuff appeared first on Moonbeard.  ( 1 min )
  • Open

    Comic for 2022.08.15 - My Wife
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Unreliable Connection
    No content preview  ( 1 min )

  • Open

    Nyhetsquiz vecka 32 2022: Teknikhösten närmar sig
    Intel Arc "Alchemist", kvartalsrapporter och färska produkter trängs i nyhetsflödet. Hur mycket har du snappat upp under den här varma augustiveckan?  ( 5 min )
    AMD Ryzen 7000 syns i webbutik
    Det återstår en månad innan Ryzen 7000 enligt uppgift finns på hyllorna, men en kanadensisk återförsäljare listar redan nu en framtida processorkvartett.  ( 5 min )
    Söndagsmatiné: Nödig moddare bygger skithäftig dator
    I veckans video visas hur en dator kan byggas in i toalettstolen – perfekt för skräckspel eller extra långa sittningar.  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Intel Drops DirectX 9 Support On Xe, Arc GPUs, Switches to DirectX 12 Emulation
    Intel has made the decision to remove native DirectX 9 support from its latest Xe iGPs and Arc GPUs, and replace DX9 with DX12 emulation instead.  ( 60 min )
    MSI’s AMD X670E and X670-P Motherboards Listed With Euro Pricing
    MSI’s MPG X670E Carbon Wi-Fi is about €620, and the MSI Pro X670-P Wi-Fi about €410 on average. Converting to USD and taking off VAT would give pricing of $495 and $320, respectively.  ( 62 min )
    Ryzen 7000 Retailer Pricing Shows Big Hike Over Ryzen 5000
    Preliminary Ryzen 7000 prices are here and are roughly 10 to 12% higher than Ryzen 5000 was at MSRP.  ( 59 min )
    Raspberry Pi Drives Tiny CNC Drawing Machine
    Maker and developer Pheux9558 is using a Raspberry Pi to power a custom CNC drawing machine with the help of an Arduino and recycled PC components.  ( 62 min )
    How To Make A Raspberry Pi Pico W Web Server
    The Raspberry Pi Pico W is mostly found powering maker projects, but in this how-to we use it to build an extremely low power web server.  ( 64 min )
  • Open

    PS4 sold "twice as many" units as Xbox One, new court papers show
    New court documents have confirmed that Sony's PS4 console sold "twice as many" units as Microsoft's Xbox One during last-gen's "console wars". Confirmation comes via Brazilian court papers wherein Microsoft is defending its acquisition of Activision Blizzard in front of the Brazilian competition authority, CADE. As spotted by GameLuster and translated via Google Translate - so bear with me; this may not be a 100 per cent word-for-word translation - page 17/18 (paragraph 46) of Microsoft's own published court papers state that "Sony has surpassed Microsoft in terms of console sales and installed [sic] base, having sold more than twice as many Xbox [One units] in the last generation". Read more  ( 16 min )
    If you've been offered a Lil Gator beta code, it's probably fake
    Playtonic and developer MegaWobble have reached out to fans of its upcoming Lil Gator Game to warn them that any emails purporting to be offering beta testing are a "scam". "It has come to our attention that someone is offering beta testing for Lil Gator Game," publisher Playtonic tweeted over the weekend. "We can confirm this is a SCAM and not from Playtonic or Lil Gator Game. "If we were offering this to our communities we would announce it on our Twitter and not via any other channels," the tweet added. Read more  ( 15 min )
    This Better Call Saul Gameboy fan game is the best thing we'll never play
    Three fans have taken Better Call Saul and Gameboy'd it. A three-minute teaser - which includes light spoilers for S1E9, S5E8, and S6E5, so be warned - lovingly recreates Vince Gilligan and Peter Gould's Breaking Bad spin-off as a monochrome Gameboy game, complete with plenty of fan service touches, including one of the scariest things I've ever seen: a happy Mike. The demake includes character options - which ranks your three playable characters Jimmy, Kim, and Mike by their Guts, Hustle, Authority, and Lawyer traits as well as unique passive skills - cut-scenes, and even a fab chip-tune version of the theme track. The slightly spoilerific gameplay we see plays on some of the scenarios Jimmy's found himself in over the years and I really, really want to play it. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Apple Silicon Face-Off: M1 Ultra and M1 Max take on high-end PC juggernauts
    It's high time Digital Foundry took a look at Apple Silicon and today we're going to be looking at the higher-end chips in the line-up. Our focus is on the monster that is the M1 Ultra, found within the latest Apple Mac Studio, but we're also going to be checking out the MacBook Pro's M1 Max. It's the M1 Ultra that truly commands our attention though: this system-on-chip represents the highest end computer processor Apple has designed to date, with the firm claiming it should be as fast as a high-end Windows desktop. Packing 20 CPU cores, a 21 teraflop GPU, and 800GB/s of memory bandwidth, it certainly seems like it could be - but how does it measure up in real-world testing and how well does it game? The M1 and M2 lines are the culmination of a long journey that has seen the firm transition away from SoCs based on third party design and IP, moving all chip design in-house to the furthest extent realistically possible. Apple designs its own GPUs, its own CPUs, and handles SoC design and integration. This results in tremendous control over processor design - the kind of control you would need to scale a phone processor up for high-end desktops. Which brings us to the M1 Ultra. Since 2020, Apple has been moving its Mac desktops and notebooks away from Intel CPUs and AMD GPUs and over to its in-house SOCs, taking the same fundamental tech from iPhones and integrating it into computers. Apple started with lower-end and lower-power form factors, but finally came around to high-end desktops with the release of the Ultra a few months ago. The M1 Ultra isn't really its own unique chip, however. It's actually two M1 Max SoCs connected over a high-bandwidth 2.5TB/s interposer. To the operating system and the user it seems like one monolithic chip with 1 CPU and GPU, but in reality this is two chips linked through a first-of-its-kind interconnect with the performance to support a dual-chip GPU and CPU. Read more  ( 24 min )
    Another unannounced Avatar game has popped up online
    It looks like another Avatar game - this one called Avatar The Last Airbender: Quest for Balance - is on the way. This is a different Avatar game from Ubisoft's recently delayed Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, and also different from Avatar: Generations, which was announced earlier this week and is, confusingly, also seemingly based on the popular Nickelodeon animated series Avatar: The Last Airbender. As spotted by VGC, the unannounced PS4 game has popped up on Amazon Japan with a mid-November release date, but interestingly, it's listed as an import from North America, suggesting it's a Western release. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Here's Genshin Impact's 3.0 update release date
    A new livestream has revealed more about Genshin Impact's upcoming 3.0 update, The Morn a Thousand Rose Brings. Along with a lengthy new teaser video - which you can see below - we learned that 3.0, entitled The Morn a Thousand Rose Brings, is all set to release on 24th August, 2022. As Jessica recently summarised for us, 3.0 brings the Sumeru region to the game, the Dendro element, continues the main storyline, and will introduce lots of new characters. We now know these include four-star Electro Dori, along with upcoming additions five-star Dendro Tighnari and Collei, the latter of which - who is a four-star Dendro specialist - can be added for free via the Graven Innocence event. Zhongli is making a return, along with Ganyu and Kokomi, all of whom are five-star. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Ghost of Tsushima movie will be "a complete Japanese cast, in Japanese"
    Director Chad Stahelski has confirmed that his movie adaptation of Ghost of Tsushima will be "a complete Japanese cast, in Japanese". Speaking to Collider, Stahelski said that while it may "scare the shit out of most people", Sony is "on board with backing [him] on that" and "Western audiences in general are getting more and more used to [reading subtitles]". "Honestly, it's probably the same things that would scare the shit out of most people. It's a fantasy period piece," he said. "It's done with reverence to Akira Kurosawa, who's probably in the top five biggest influences of my life as far as film goes. It's a chance to push technology and people in a story that's timeless. It's your typical mythological story of good versus evil, finding a man, watching him change the world or the world changes him. It's all the Joseph Campbell stuff that you'd love in a story. You put that in with, obviously, so I'm told I have a bit of a Samurai fetish, which is probably true from Manga and anime and stuff. Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    Nintendo has no plans for a Nintendo Switch price hike "at this point"
    Despite widespread issues regarding part shortages, Nintendo has recently confirmed that it has plans to increase the price of the Nintendo Switch. Earlier this month, Nintendo did report that Switch sales had fallen by 23% due to the semiconductor components shortage, but company president Shuntaro Furukawa has confirmed to Nikkei that the company wants to "avoid pricing people out," (thanks NME). "We're not considering [a price increase] at this point, for two reasons," said Furukawa. "Nintendo has sold more than 100 million Switch units so far, and it's important to maintain the momentum of our overall business. Generally speaking, a weak yen makes domestic Switch sales less profitable." Read more  ( 15 min )
    Gotham Knights trailer shows off Red Hood and his definitely non-lethal fighting style
    Gotham Knights has steadily been showing us different members of the Bat family, with the latest trailer giving us a look at the rowdy Red Hood. Batman's whole deal, typically anyway, is that he doesn't kill anybody. That obviously has something to do with his own parents being killed, which he didn't exactly respond to in the most healthy way, but you still, it's a pretty hard rule. That rule doesn't apply so much to Red Hood, aka Jason Todd, a former Robin, as you can see in the most recent trailer and the frequency with which he shoots people. OK so technically if you look at his character page on the official website, he has supposedly "embraced Batman's non-lethal combat methods," but his character trailer sure does show him using a whole lot of violent combat methods, and he still does dual wield a couple of pistols. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Taking down PT from PSN store was "an awkard conversation" says the person who had to do it
    Eight years after the Silent Hills demo first released, the person responsible for taking PT down from the PSN store discusses what happened. We all dearly wish we could have seen Hideo Kojima's take on Silent Hill (and obviously so does he), but unfortunately we likely never will, outside of any footage of PT that's currently online. PT was an incredibly promising demo, and now due to its cancellation isn't even downloadable for those that owned it at any point in time. And now the very person who had it taken down from the PSN has spoken about the situation. At the time of PT's release, Pearl L. was Konami's first-party lead, and took to Twitter to talk pretty openly about some behind the scenes events regarding PT, though has since made their account private. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Microsoft makes bold claim that Sony pays "blocking rights" to stop games appearing on Game Pass
    According to a recent report, Microsoft has claimed that Sony pays for "blocking rights" to prevent developers adding their games to Xbox Game Pass. As reported by The Verge, the fairly substantial accusation comes as part of some documents that have been filed with Brazil's national competition regulator, as well as being part of a review of Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard. "Microsoft’s ability to continue expanding Game Pass has been hampered by Sony’s desire to inhibit such growth," Microsoft itself claims in a filing to the Administrative Council for Economic Defence, or CADE (translations from The Verge). "Sony pays for 'blocking rights' to prevent developers from adding content to Game Pass and other competing subscription services." Read more  ( 15 min )
    Saints Row gameplay overview shows off all the factions out to get you
    Saints Row is out in less than two weeks, so Volition and Deep Silver have dropped a new gameplay overview trailer diving into what you can expect from the game. For a gameplay overview trailer, there isn't much in the way of actual in-game gameplay, but it did dive into the various factions you'll meet in the game. First up is Los Panteros, who's run by certified beefcake Sergio. They're all about smuggling, and "have no hesitations about getting up on your business," making them one to watch out for. Then there's the more tech oriented, club culture donned Idols, who don't have any particular leader, only a faceless group known as The Collective, but do have a penchant for masks that Daft Punk would potentially approve of. Read more  ( 16 min )
    SpongeBob Squarepants: The Cosmic Shake gets a wonderfully colourful first gameplay trailer
    First announced last year, SpongeBob Squarepants: The Cosmic Shake has received its first gameplay trailer as part of THQ Nordic's recent showcase. Described as a "spiritual sequel" to the remake Battle For Bikini Bottom: Rehydrated, The Cosmic Shake is once again a 3D platformer that looks to have a variety of themed worlds, as is typical of the genre. Stylistically it's looking incredibly good, with nice bright and vivid colours that really match the tone of the series. The showcase trailer showed off SpongeBob and a for some reason floating, tinier version of companion Patrick Star travelling around different worlds and different points in time. Both of them are appropriately themed with different costumes depending on the locale. And interestingly, the game seems to have borrowed a little bit from Breath of the Wild with a paraglider in the form of a pizza box. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Avatar: The Last Airbender is getting a mobile only open-world RPG
    Avatar: The Last Airbender is getting an official open world RPG titled Avatar: Generations, planned exclusively for mobile. Developed by Square Enix London Mobile in collaboration with Navigator Games, Avatar: Generations will be a free-to-play title based on the Nickelodeon series. The game is planned to soft launch in Canada, Denmark, South Africa, and Sweden to start, with more territories to come over the coming months. The game is only planned to release on mobile at this point in time, for both Android and iOS, though it seems that the game will not be playable on all iOS devices to start. Read more  ( 15 min )
    PUBG has raked in "80,000 new users per day" since going free-to-play
    It sounds like PUBG has done pretty well for itself since going free-to-play, apparently bringing in roughly 80,000 news users a day. More and more live service games are going free-to-play, with PUBG having done so in January of this year, and Fall Guys having done the same in June. A big part of that is likely to bring in more players, especially because all of the big, successful live service titles like Apex Legends and Destiny 2 are free-to-play. And according to developer Krafton's preliminary earnings report for the first half of 2022, PUBG going free to play has certainly helped. The report states that since going free-to-play in January, PUBG "has seen a steady inflow of more than 80,000 new users per day." To give you an idea of how many new players that is, PUBG went free-to-play 214 days ago, meaning over 17 million players have signed-up to play the game. Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    Alla roller i Ghost of Tsushima-filmen kommer spelas av japanska skådisar
    ...och alla kommer prata japanska.  ( 7 min )
    Svenska Block'Em lanseras den 8:e september
    Blocka dina vänner på Steam.  ( 6 min )
    Kan ett nytt South Park-spel vara under utveckling hos THQ?
    Heta South Park-rykten hos THQ  ( 6 min )
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    Dirk Eddelbuettel: RcppArmadillo used by 1001 CRAN Packages
    It is with a mix of pride and joy, but also some genuine astonishment and amazement, that we can share that the counter of reverse dependencies at CRAN for our RcppArmadillo package for R just crossed 1000 packages [1]: Conrad actually posted this a few weeks ago, by my count we were then still a few packages shy. In any event, having crossed this marker this summer, either then or now, and after more than a dozen years of working on the package is a really nice moment. Google Scholar counts nearly 500 citations for our CSDA paper (also this vignette), and that ratio of nearly a citation for every two packages used is certainly impressive. We have had the pleasure of working with so many other researchers and scientists using RcppArmadillo. Its combination of performance (C++, after all, …  ( 3 min )
    Jamie McClelland: Web caching is hard
    Web caching is hard. And also, maybe I’m not that good under pressure? In any event, I made the following mistakes while trying to debug a web site using our nginx cache that bit the dust under heavy load today: Action: I ran curl -I https://website.org/ and it hung. Wrong assumption: Something is wrong with nginx. Why else would it just hang? Reconsidered conclusion: The resource (the home page) is a MISS, so nginx has to retrieve it from the origin, but the origin is over-loaded and timing out, so my request is also timing out. Maybe something is wrong with the nginx caching configuration since the home page really should be a HIT… but that’s another problem. Action: I changed the configuration from our normal caching set of directives to our aggressive caching set of directives, reloade…  ( 2 min )
    Sergio Durigan Junior: Debuginfod is coming to Ubuntu
    These past couple of months I have been working to bring debuginfod to Ubuntu. I thought it would be a good idea to make this post and explain a little bit about what the service is and how I'm planning to deploy it. A quick recap: what's debuginfod? Here's a good summary of what debuginfod is: debuginfod is a new-ish project whose purpose is to serve ELF/DWARF/source-code information over HTTP. It is developed under the elfutils umbrella. You can find more information about it here: https://sourceware.org/elfutils/Debuginfod.html In a nutshell, by using a debuginfod service you will not need to install debuginfo (a.k.a. dbgsym) files anymore; the symbols will be served to GDB (or any other debuginfo consumer that supports debuginfod) over the network. Ultimately, this makes the de…  ( 2 min )
    Russ Allbery: Review: Still Not Safe
    Review: Still Not Safe, by Robert L. Wears & Kathleen M. Sutcliffe Publisher: Oxford University Press Copyright: November 2019 ISBN: 0-19-027128-0 Format: Kindle Pages: 232 Still Not Safe is an examination of the recent politics and history of patient safety in medicine. Its conclusions are summarized by the opening paragraph of the preface: Robert Wears was Professor of Emergency Medicine at the University of Florida specializing in patient safety. Kathleen Sutcliffe is Professor of Medicine and Business at Johns Hopkins. This book is based on research funded by a grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, for which both Wears and Sutcliffe were primary investigators. (Wears died in 2017, but the acknowledgments imply that at least ea…  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Comic for 2022.08.14 - Now
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    AI could save future firefighters from deadly flashover explosions
    NIST-led engineers are working on building a real-time alert system AI could help save firefighters' lives by predicting fire flashovers before they occur, according to new research published this week. …  ( 5 min )
    Your AI-generated digital artwork may not be protected by US copyright
    Do we want to recognise machines as authors? The creative nature of neural networks is leading some to consider whether it might be worth changing current US laws that only grant copyright protection for works created by humans.…  ( 6 min )
    Meta's AI internet chatbot demo quickly starts spewing fake news and racist remarks
    Plus: How Google is using language models to improve search, and watch Heinz's AI ketchup advert In-brief  Another day, another rogue AI chatbot on the internet.…  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Intel Xeon Platinum 8380 Performance Is Looking Great For Linux 6.0
    Not only is the AMD EPYC performance looking real good for Linux 6.0, but many of the scheduler changes and common kernel improvements also carry over well for Intel's Xeon Platinum 8380 "Ice Lake" server processors too. For your viewing pleasure this weekend are some initial benchmarks looking at Linux 5.19 stable compared to Linux 6.0 Git as we approach the end of the merge window...  ( 5 min )
    Ubuntu Linux Preparing systemd-hwe To Ease OEM Hardware Enablement
    Being prepared for Ubuntu 22.10 and presumably will be back-ported in future Ubuntu 22.04 LTS point releases is the systemd-hwe package to more easily deal with updated hardware rules as part of new device enablement...  ( 5 min )
    Wine-Staging 7.15 Released - Currently At 536 Patches Atop Upstream Wine
    Following yesterday's belated release of Wine 7.15, Wine-Staging 7.15 is now available that continues to carry hundreds of extra testing/experimental patches atop upstream Wine for bug fixes and other features to empower Windows games and applications on Linux...  ( 5 min )
    Glibc 2.36 Dropping DT_HASH Has Been Breaking Easy Anti Cheat Games With Steam Play
    Those on rolling-release Linux distributions that are quick to adapt to new toolchain updates are finding Easy Anti Cheat (EAC) enabled games breaking when running on the recently released Glibc 2.36. The breakage stems from the DT_HASH section being dropped in GNU C Library but EAC being among the few software still expecting that section rather than DT_GNU_HASH...  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    The Sunday Papers
    Sundays are for using a gyroscope to rehabilitate your ailing wrist. Before you rotate, let's read this week's best writing about games (and game related things). Read more  ( 17 min )
    Final Fantasy 14's Island Sanctuary update will arrive on August 23rd
    As a non-player, the trailer for Final Fantasy 14's Patch 6.2, Buried Memory, is indistinguishable from every other patch trailer. There's enormous boss monsters, several types of void, an incongruous cat creature, Death maybe... Where it differs is that there are also a few glimpses of the Island Sanctuary, FFXIV's new solo farming content. Watch it below ahead of the newly announced release date: August 23rd. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Gothic 1 Remake's new trailer captures the atmosphere of the original
    Gothic was one of those PC games I dismissed as being for nerds. Me? I was too busy making Half-Life levels and reading Championship Manager fanfic to be interested in some game about mages in a hole. I've since realised the errors of my ways, and I quite fancy the chance to correct my previous wrongs via the Gothic 1 remake. There's a new trailer for it and its big modern hole below. Read more  ( 16 min )
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    How to Record Audio in Linux With Audacity (and Reduce Noise)
    Audacity is an incredibly useful tool for quick audio edits. Here's how you can install it on Linux and use it for audio recording and background noise removal.  ( 24 min )

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    Jagged Alliance 3's new trailer shows a few seconds of the only feature I care about
    THQ Nordic announced Jagged Alliance 3 during their September showcase last year. It's only fitting that it returned during this year's showcase, bringing a much more detailed trailer to show off how combat will work. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Outcast 2: A New Beginning gets a new trailer showing combat and jetpacks
    Outcast 2: A New Beginning was announced last September with a cinematic trailer. We got a glimpse of the game itself this week, including jetpacking, combat, and Cutter Slade's thick eyebrows. Read more  ( 16 min )
    What are we all playing this weekend?
    That rumbling you hear over the horizon is not exactly Gamescom looming nearer; it's the rumbling of the tummies of video games bloggers anticipating eating spiralised potatoes and hot dogs from a food van outside the venue. Less than two weeks to go! But before then, we will see QuakeCon next week. And before then, what are you playing this weekend? Here's what we're clicking on! Read more  ( 17 min )
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    Wine 7.15 Adds RSA Encryption, Direct2D Command Lists
    Wine 7.15 is out a day late as the newest development snapshot of this open-source software for enjoying Windows games and applications on Linux and other platforms. Wine is also what serves as the base for Valve's Proton that powers Steam Play...  ( 4 min )
    AMD Radeon 680M Graphics Benchmarks Across Various Linux Kernel, Mesa Versions
    With the Ryzen 6000 "Rembrandt" mobile processors most exciting about these Zen 3+ SoCs has been the energy efficiency improvements and moving from Vega to RDNA2 graphics as with the Radeon 680M found on the Ryzen 7 PRO 6850U that I have been running many Linux benchmarks on over the past several weeks. For those wondering if it pays off moving to a newer Linux kernel or Mesa version with Radeon 680M integrated graphics, here are some reference benchmarks I recently conducted...  ( 5 min )
    Linux Gets New Patch To Fix AMD Retbleed Mitigation - STIBP Needed With IBPB
    Sent out this morning is a Linux kernel "fix" that now enabled STIBP when using the IBPB mode for Retbleed mitigations on AMD processors. In other words, more protections needed for this enhanced mode of Retbleed mitigation...  ( 5 min )
    RISC-V Lands New Extensions In Linux 6.0
    Last week was the main set of RISC-V updates for Linux 6.0 that included improving Svpbmt support, a more robust default kernel configuration, and other improvements. A secondary set of RISC-V CPU architecture updates has now been merged for Linux 6.0...  ( 5 min )
    Plasma 5.26 Improving Widget Accessibility, Kickoff Gets Compact Mode + Wayland Fixes
    It's been another busy summer week for KDE developers with many new features and fixes landing within this open-source desktop stack...  ( 4 min )
    Many VirtIO Changes Land For Linux 6.0
    A number of changes were merged into Linux 6.0 for benefiting virtualization when making use of VirtIO...  ( 4 min )
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    Windows compatibility layer Wine version 7.15 out now
    Wine is a compatibility layer that aims to let you run games and applications designed for Windows on Linux and a new release version 7.15 is out now.  ( 4 min )
    Humble Bundle have another interesting set of games in the Tactical Combat Bundle
    Need more games to fill up your library? Humble Bundle have put up another one that looks pretty good with the Tactical Combat Bundle. So here's what to expect on Linux desktop and Steam Deck.  ( 4 min )
    Spider-Man Remastered is awesome on Steam Deck
    With Spider-Man Remastered now available on Steam after previously being PlayStation exclusive, I took it for a spin on Steam Deck and Linux desktop.  ( 4 min )
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    Outcast 2: A New Beginning trailer gives us a story background and a look at gameplay
    A new story and gameplay trailer for Outcast 2: A New Beginning was shown during THQ Nordic's digital showcase yesterday. The sequel is in development at Appeal Studios which developed the original title. Set 20 years after the original game, in it, you play as ex-Navy SEAL Cutter Slade who has returned to the alien world of Adelpha. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Final Fantasy 14 Online patch 6.2, Buried Memory, has a release date
    A release date has been set for Final Fantasy 14 Online patch 6.2, Buried Memory. Releasing August 23, provided during the latest Letter from the Producer Live broadcast presented by producer and director Naoki Yoshida, the news was accompanied by a new trailer and information on the latest chapter that includes fresh battle challenges and the Island Sanctuary. During the broadcast, Yoshida offered viewers a demonstration of Island Sanctuary, a new type of casual solo content that allows you to build and customize your own farm on a deserted island. You will do this by gathering materials, building facilities, caring for creatures, and more, without the need for prior crafting or gathering experience. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered PC - recommended Optimized Settings provided by Digital Foundry
    Digital Foundry has given Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered a go on PC, and to help you get the best experience, a chart featuring recommended Optimized Settings was provided. If you head over through the link, you will see the chart, as well as a breakdown of how each setting affects the game for good or ill. On PC, Marvel's Spider-Man features ray-traced reflections with varying quality levels, one of which is a new, higher-quality ray-traced mode that offers even more city detail. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Gothic Remake trailer takes you on a visit to the Old Mine
    THQ Nordic has released a new trailer for Gothic Remake that takes you into the Old Mine, a place that would be terrible for a picnic. In development with Alkimia Interactive, the team’s focus and ambition is to build high-quality remake of the RPG which is set to be released for PC and next-gen consoles. In December 2019, THQ Nordic released a playable Gothic remake prototype asking for public opinion on a possible modern remake of the classic RPG. The playable teaser appeared in the Steam Library of everyone who owned a game from Piranha Bytes. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Nightingale’s Early Access release moved into next year
    The upcoming Early Access period for Victorian-style fantasy game Nightingale has been delayed. The game's developer, Inflexion Games, stated the reason behind the delay was a switch to Unreal Engine 5. Because of the switch, the game will now go into Early Access sometime in 2023. “We’ve made the difficult decision to delay Nightingale’s Early Access release to the first half of 2023,” said Inflexion in the statement. “We’ll have more news on specific timing at a later stage.” Read more  ( 16 min )
    THQ Nordic teases in-development South Park game
    During its showcase yesterday, THQ Nordic closed the stream by teasing the next South Park game. Further details were not provided, but when the teaser was shown, you could hear Randy Marsh yelling "hot hot hot hot" in the background. I wonder how many courics it was this time? This isn't the first bit of news we've heard regarding a new South Park game in development. Read more  ( 15 min )
    What are you playing this weekend?
    Friday is done and dusted. Everyone has clocked out, ran out the door as fast as possible, and jumped into their cars or ran to catch the next train home. Hopefully, the traffic or the ride wasn't too bad on the commute home. Now that folks have arrived at their domicile, it's time to kick off the shoes, change into some sweats or yoga pants (even just skivvies - we don't judge!), grab some beer or wine, fire up the console or PC and gave a nice sit down to take their weekly frustrations out by playing a game or two. That's what we're doing anyway, and here's what we're playing: Read more  ( 16 min )
    Catch up with news from THQ Nordic's 2022 Digital Showcase and Publisher Sale
    Yes, it’s getting towards the middle of August, but that doesn’t mean the big summer of game announcements is over yet – last night (August 12) we saw THQ Nordic take to the airwaves to show off a selection of new games, including a brand new Alone in the Dark reboot. Founded in 2011, THQ Nordic is an Austrian video game publisher and developer that has been snapping up the rights to game properties and IP across the world, as well as funding its own studios to create new series. Developers like Black Forest Games, Bugbear Entertainment, Gunfire Games, HandyGames, Piranha Bytes, Purple Lamp Studios, Rainbow Studios and many more besides fit under the THQ Nordic umbrella, working on internationally renowned series like Wreckfest, SpongeBob SquarePants, and Destory All Humans! The publisher is known for not just sticking to one style, too – whether you’re into motorsport, action-adventure, RPGs, or whatever else, there’s likely something you’ll be interested in coming from THQ Nordic. The publisher said itself that it wanted to "land a massive punch" with this showcase – and with Wreckreation and Alone in the Dark, it seems that mission was accomplished. Read more  ( 16 min )
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    Försäljningen av processorer för stationära når bottennivå
    Sötebrödsdagarna ser ut att vara över, men AMD trotsar trenden och kniper marknadsandelar.  ( 6 min )
    Helgsnack: Vad ser du fram emot under hårdvaruhösten 2022?
    När temperaturerna dalar och löven skiftar färg, växlar hårdvaruföretagen upp. Berätta vilka lanseringar och komponenter du ser fram emot!  ( 5 min )
    Uppdatering för Memtest86 ska visa vilken minneskrets som felar
    Med en ny uppdatering ska minnestestet kunna peka på precis var felet ligger, förutsatt att systemet i fråga använder Intels "Alder Lake" med DDR5-minne.  ( 5 min )
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    Intel Inadvertently Narrows Down Arc A770, A750 GPU Pricing
    Intel has changed the prize pool in its GPU-focused scavenger hunt to include an alternative Core i5-12600K or Core i7-12700K prize for the original Arc A750 and A770 prizes.  ( 59 min )
    AMD Radeon RX 6900 XT Graphics Cards Dip Below $700
    From an MSRP of $999 to astronomical crypto-boom era prices nearing $2,000, multiple Radeon RX 6900 XT options are now available for $699.  ( 59 min )
    CPU Benchmarks and Hierarchy 2022: Processor Ranking Charts
    All of today's desktop CPU benchmarks compared, including Intel's 12th-Gen Core series and AMD's Ryzen Zen 3 and Threadripper.  ( 85 min )
    How To Remove Background Noise, Distortion in Audacity
    Using the free audio editor, Audacity, learn how to restore old recordings and improve audio clarity.  ( 63 min )
    Wuque Studio Ikki68 Aurora R2 Review: Transformer
    The Ikki68 Aurora R2 is an excellent, mid-tier custom keyboard kit. It’s on the pricier side, especially for its lack of battery, but for that money, you get exceptional customization to ensure you find the typing experience you’re looking for. It looks, sounds, and feels great to type on.  ( 70 min )
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    The person responsible for adding - and removing - PT from the PSN store speaks for the first time
    The person responsible for putting PT onto the Sony storefront - as well as having to take it back off again - has spoken about the situation for the first time. Pearl Lai, who was Konami's first-party lead at the time, took to Twitter to talk candidly - and diplomatically - about the time the free-to-play Silent Hills teaser was controversially pulled from the Sony store eight years ago yesterday (12th August). "Fun fact: since I was the first-party lead at the time at Konami, I helped get this product set up on the storefronts, fake publisher and everything," they tweeted (thanks, VGC). Read more  ( 16 min )
    Capcom producer Hiroyuki Kobayashi leaves after 27 years to join NetEase
    Producer Hiroyuki Kobayashi has parted ways with Capcom after 27 years. Whilst Kobayashi left Capcom on 1st March 2022, he chose 12th August - his 50th birthday - to make the announcement that he had left the famed Japanese company to take up another producer position at NetEase. "Today, 12th August, is my 50th birthday," Kobayashi's statement begins. "As such, I would like to share something very special with everyone: After serving 27 years with gratitude, I have departed from Capcom on 1st March and will be officially joining NetEase as a producer. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Nintendo won't increase the price of Nintendo Switch "at this point"
    Nintendo has confirmed that it has no plans to increase the price of its Nintendo Switch console. Despite a drop in sales of around 23 per cent year-on-year - chiefly due to the tech industry's ongoing shortage of semiconductor parts stifling manufacturing - Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa told Nikkei that Nintendo wanted to "avoid pricing people out". "We're not considering [a price increase] at this point, for two reasons," Furukawa said (thanks, NME). "In order to offer unique entertainment to a wide range of customers, we want to avoid pricing people out. Our competition is the variety of entertainment in the world, and we always think about pricing in terms of the value of the fun we offer. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Phasmophobia players want smaller maps
    It looks like a lot of Phasmophobia players hope to see smaller maps in upcoming updates. In a poll in the game's subreddit community and spotted by PCGN, players were invited to vote on the next map they would like to see join the Phasmophobia rotation. Options include a circus/carnival, mall/movie theatre, manufacturing plant, office park/corporate building, and a small town square. Whilst thousands of players have voted on their preference, some took to the comments to talk about the size those hypothetical maps could be, and posited that smaller maps were important, too. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Diablo Immortal players are reporting a new bug that is "reducing XP for everyone"
    Diablo Immortal players are reporting a new bug that is "reducing XP for everyone". A thread on the game's subreddit community - complete with examples and screenshots - is claiming that "there’s a bug that reduces the XP earned on a significant portion of kills and XP globes". "We don’t fully understand why or when it will happen," explains u/staplepies (thanks, NME), who's one of five players "looking at this on and off for the last month or so". Read more  ( 16 min )
    Tiny Tina's Wonderlands' Shattering Spectreglass DLC "expands the endgame experience"
    Tiny Tina's Wonderlands' fourth DLC chapter, Shattering Spectreglass, is out now, "expanding the endgame experience" with a new class, better character creation options, a new boss, and "incredible loot". Available for no extra cost for those who already own the season pass - and to buy separately for those who don't - Shattering Spectreglass ushers in the all-new Blightcaller class which "allows players to harness the noxious essence of swamps with potent precision, alongside new ways to customise your Fatemaker, including an all-new voice". "Shattering Spectreglass begins in Dreamveil Overlook, where players will face Vesper’s most personal Mirror of Mystery yet," 2K explains. "Shattering Spectreglass offers a window into Vesper's memories, which are plagued by visions of Redmourne the Trivern, a mighty beast that can grow multiple heads and feeds on fear, siphoning his power from lost souls. Bringing down this winged behemoth once and for all is the only way to help Vesper escape her past." Read more  ( 16 min )
    There's a new South Park game on the way
    THQ Nordic rounded out its 2022 Showcase by teasing a new South Park game. "As of today, THQ Nordic (HandyGames not included) has 43 games in development. Thereof 26 still unannounced AFTER this showcase," the broadcast confirmed at the end of the presentation. "Thank you for watching." Moments later, though, the 26 is crossed out, and the text fades to the South Park Digital Studios logo - head to 55min and 11secs on the video below to see for yourself: Read more  ( 15 min )
    NBA 2K23 reveals more about its upcoming mode The Jordan Challenge
    NBA 2K23 is inviting you to "experience Michael Jordan's most iconic moments" in its upcoming Jordan Challenge mode. The game mode will include 15 "playable moments from Jordan's career that let players relive his legacy from the early days as a college sensation, to his game-winning shot in the 1998 NBA Finals". Each challenge will include a pre-game interview with a "luminary who was part of what made every game special" and a new presentation package that recreates how the games would've looked as they were originally broadcast in the 80s and 90s. Read more  ( 16 min )
    PUBG: Battlegrounds boasts 80,000 more daily players since going free-to-play
    PUBG: Battlegrounds has clocked up 80,000 new players daily since going free-to-play earlier this year. Confirming the new figures in its latest financial report, developer/publisher Krafton confirmed that net profit for the company was up 37 per cent when compared with the same quarter last year, even though both operating profit and revenue were down by 6.9 per cent and 7.8 per cent respectively. 94 per cent of the battle royale's revenue is generated outside of South Korea, where the game is made. Read more  ( 16 min )
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    The weekend’s best deals: Apple MacBook Air, Resident Evil bundle, and more
    Dealmaster also has the Xbox Series S, Apple Watch Series 7, and Nvidia Shield TV.  ( 9 min )
    A little taste of everything that’s out there
    The book The Short Story of the Universe really does have it all.  ( 5 min )
    How long will it take to understand long COVID?
    Researchers have proposed a variety of theories to explain symptoms of COVID long-haulers.  ( 6 min )
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    Paula Manrique smyglanserar gaming-inspirerade klädkollektion på Space i Stockholm
    Gamerkläder för tjejer på Space  ( 6 min )
    FZ Play - Vi startar sekt i Cult of the Lamb
    I afton sekt.  ( 6 min )
    Alone in the Dark återskapas av manusskrivaren bakom Soma
    Vågar du vara ensam i mörkret?  ( 6 min )
    Hogwarts Legacy släpps den 10:e februari nästa år
    Polera trollstavarna och ta fram kvastarna.  ( 6 min )
    Hogwarts Legacy släpps den 10:e februari i år
    Polera trollstavarna och ta fram kvastarna.  ( 6 min )
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    AI laser probe for prostate cancer enters clinical trials
    FDA says yes to the tests AI software capable of mapping tumor tissue more accurately to help surgeons treat and shrink prostate cancer using a laser-powered needle will soon be tested in real patients during clinical trials.…  ( 5 min )
    Ukraine's cyber chief comes to Black Hat in surprise visit
    Tl;DR - the news isn't good Black Hat In Brief  Victor Zhora, Ukraine's lead cybersecurity official, made an unannounced visit to Black Hat in Las Vegas this week, where he spoke to attendees about the state of cyberwarfare in the country's conflict with Russia. The picture Zhora painted was bleak.…  ( 8 min )
    Intel finally takes the hint on software optimization
    Don't have the budget or customer base for Graviton-class silicon? Intel thinks it can help In a quest to deliver better application performance and greater efficiency, many software and hardware vendors are turning to custom silicon to achieve their goals.…  ( 5 min )
    Let there be ambient light sensing, without fear of data theft
    Six years on web devs finally settle on sensor privacy defenses Six years after web security and privacy concerns surfaced about ambient light sensors in mobile phones and notebooks, browser boffins have finally implemented defenses.…  ( 5 min )
    Palo Alto bug used for DDoS attacks and there's no fix yet
    There goes the weekend... A high-severity Palo Alto Networks denial-of-service (DoS) vulnerability has been exploited by miscreants looking to launch DDoS attacks, and several of the affected products won't have a patch until next week.…  ( 5 min )
    Starlink satellite dish cracked on stage at Black Hat
    Once the modchip plans are live, you can, too Black Hat  A security researcher has shown how to, with physical access at least, fully take over a Starlink satellite terminal using a homemade modchip.…  ( 5 min )
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    Comic for 2022.08.13 - Smooth
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 5 min )

  • Open

    Here's everything shown during tonight's THQ Nordic showcase
    The all-consuming IP hoover that is THQ Nordic has done a showcase! Mixing a nostalgia-baiting slate of 90s revivals with some intriguing newcomers, it was a surprisingly busy one too. So if you missed it and find yourself eager for updates on previously announced titles like Outcast 2, Jagged Alliance 3, and Gothic, plus some big new reveals - most notably the return of Alone in the Dark - read on. Alone in the Dark As rumoured, the grandaddy of survival horror is back in what THQ Nordic and developer Pieces Interactive is calling a "reimagining" of the 1992 original. It's being written and directed by Mikael Hedberg, who wrote the stunning Soma at Frictional Games, and is coming to Xbox, PlayStation, and PC at a later date. We've got a little more on this promising project elsewhere. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Dangerous Driving dev's Wreckreation is an open-world racer with a DIY focus
    UK developer Three Fields Entertainment - the studio behind the likes of Dangerous Golf and Dangerous Driving - has unveiled Wreckreaction, a new custom-content-focused open-world racer coming to PC, PlayStation, and Xbox next year. Three Fields - a studio founded by a small group of ex-Criterion developers - describes Wreckreaction as a game of high-speed racing, crashing, stunts, and exploration, all of which unfolds across a 400-square-mile map. That map is designed to represent an entire (fictitious) American state split into four areas, albeit one predominantly themed around woodland, grassland, and sandy beaches. As to how players approach the challenges within Wreckreaction's world, the idea is that it's entirely up to them, with Three Fields saying it wants to encourage a more freeform style of fun as players explore the world in search of races, short cuts, and challenges. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Become a galactic property magnate in cute management game Space for Sale
    Mirage Game Studios - the developer behind well-received factory sim Little Big Workshop - has shared a first look at its adorable galactic property magnate game Space for Sale, which is due to launch on PC at a currently undisclosed date. Space for Sale casts players in the role of a cute astronaut that's just bought an entire galaxy on the cheap, with the aim of turning it into a dream destination for alien homeseekers across the cosmos. To reach that goal, players must scour the galaxy's procedural planets in search of the perfect spot to fulfil their clients' sometimes eccentric needs. Although Space for Sale's basic concept sounds very management sim, Mirage says the game's sandbox-style gameplay is more of a "hands-on experience" than that might suggest, with players needing to explore each planet in person as they hunt down the ideal location to drop a plot, construct buildings, collect resources, scan items, and so on. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Survival horror classic Alone in the Dark is being 'reimagined' by Soma writer
    THQ Nordic is 'reimagining' survival horror classic Alone in the Dark, with Soma and Amnesia: The Dark Descent writer Mikael Hedberg at the helm. Alone in the Dark, for those too young to remember, is widely considered to be the granddaddy of the survival horror genre, with the 1992 original pioneering the fixed-camera spook-house formula that would go on to influence the likes of Resident Evil and Silent Hill. THQ Nordic's reimagined version of Alone in the Dark - which is being handled by Swedish developer Pieces Interactive - takes the basic premise of the 1992 original, in which private detective Edward Carnby helps Emily Hartwood investigate her uncle's suicide at the gloomy Derceto Mansion, and shakes it up a little for modern audiences. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Marvel's Spider-Man PC - a patch or two away from perfection
    Developer Nixxes patched Marvel's Spider-Man a couple of hours before embargo on Wednesday, setting back our PC tech review, but the update was worth it and while a little more polish is required to get the game fully into shape, the release you'll be playing today definitely hits the spot. We've already covered the PC version in broad brush strokes, but today we can get a little more granular and offer up our optimised settings for delivering the best balance between performance and fidelity. Let's quickly recap on what we've already discussed - and it's mostly great stuff. First of all, I like the graphics configuration menu that appears before you run the game - it's a Nixxes (and IO Interactive!) hallmark that gives you an instant 'at a glance' look at the options available and allows for friction-free settings changes outside of the game. Those settings include fully realised support for practically any aspect ratio, plus configurable field of view. Not only that, but the game's full-screen support includes actual exclusive full-screen, allowing for resolutions and refresh rates outside of the desktop options - a rare thing in PC gaming today. Also impressive is how the in-game options menu actually works. Pause the game at any time and any tweaks you make are instantly deployed, allowing you to see the changes you've made in real-time. In a world where some problematic PC titles don't do this and can even require you to restart the game, this is excellent. On paper, all of the things I've praised here should be standard and second nature to PC developers but unfortunately that's not the case. Where Nixxes excels is where ports like Elden Ring, Final Fantasy VII or Halo Infinite flounder, sometimes spectacularly so. Read more  ( 20 min )
    Final Fantasy 14's Buried Memory Patch 6.2 has a release date
    Patch 6.2 for Final Fantasy 14 - named Buried Memory - will release on 23rd August. The update will add a fresh batch of story missions, as well as a farming sim mode called Island Sanctuary. An epic new trailer for the patch includes plenty of gameplay (and Endwalker story spoilers) from across the update, and some cute dancing Loporrits - moon bunnies for the uninitiated. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Master Chief beats down thugs in Yakuza 0 mod
    Play as Master Chief in Yakuza 0 thanks to the power of modder Kashiiera. The mod, uploaded earlier this week, replaces usual protagonist Kiryu Kazuma with Halo's poster boy Master Chief. Specifically his incarnation in Halo 3. Kashiiera is primarily a Halo modder as it's their favourite franchise, but they also love Yakuza and so worked hard to project Master Chief's model correctly onto Kiryu's to keep him looking as natural as possible. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Blinnk and the Vacuum of Space is a VR adventure designed for autistic players
    An upcoming VR game from Changingday is specifically designed for autistic players, and will allow users to "play at their own pace" while "[supporting] them through everyday experiences". Blinnk and the Vacuum of Space starts off on the first day of your new job at Norp Corp. However, your new boss, a certain Mister Norp, is a hungry chap, with only one demand. You must bring him "the greatest sandwich in the galaxy". This may all sound easy enough, I mean how hard can bread and filling be? Well, it turns out it can be a lot harder than you may expect, especially when robot companion Blinnk is involved. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Capcom announces two livestreams for Tokyo Games Show 2022
    Capcom has announced it will have two livestream presentations as part of Tokyo Games Show this year. The first will be on 15th September (3pm UK time) and will include "all the latest Capcom news in our pre-recorded stream". The second will follow on 16th September and focus solely on Street Fighter 6. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Arcade Paradise review: wash clothes and play games in this feat of grime-caked memory
    Let me keep this brief, as I have a wash on - a wash full of briefs! Arcade Paradise is a game about running a laundrette - at first it is anyway. It's one of those jobs a lot of us start out in even if you don't, as is the case here, have a family in the laundrette biz. You run the laundrette, day by day, bussing in and out. You collect trash, you wash and fold clothes, you unclog the toilet and empty the coin hopper in the tokens machine. You put the laundrette's income in the safe and you chat to your friends on a messenger app accessed via the 56k set-up in the back office. But in another back room there are arcade games - cabinets with playable games! It's like opening a door and finding that aliens have landed. You can play these games - play clever spins on match-three, on Mr Driller, on plenty of others - but you can also earn money from them too. You can collect the money in their coin hoppers and whack that in the safe. And what if all this money you're collecting, what if you used it to expand? To buy new cabinets, to create more room to store them in? Onwards. So Arcade Paradise moves on, in step with the rolling Katamari of commerce and capitalism. More, brighter, shinier. But also quicker, more efficient. More free time in the day is opened up by the right upgrades, so that the time, along with the money, can be reinvested. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Destiny 2 getting weapon balance changes, as Lord of Wolves gets nerfed
    Bungie has detailed some of the changes that are coming to Destiny 2. In its weekly blog post, or TWAB, the company explained some of the weapon balance changes players can expect, which includes buffing some of the game's under-utilised weapon archetypes. For example, lightweight bows will get faster draw times as well as an increased "perfect draw" window to make things a bit easier for players. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Unity wins contract with IT company that support US government
    Unity, known for its popular game engine, revealed it has signed an "exciting three-year multi-million dollar contract" with CACI International in its latest financial results. CACI International, for context, is an IT company which provides technology to various US federal and state government agencies. Marc Whitten, senior vice president at Unity and general manager of Unity Create, explained Unity's role in the contract as "defining human machine interfaces or HMI for aerospace applications and beyond" in the company's follow-up earnings call, as reported by Bloomberg. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Arcade Paradise is something special, and so much more
    It's another Friday and another Weekly - the show that recaps and discusses the week on Eurogamer for you. And remember, premium supporters of Eurogamer get these episodes every Friday, whereas everyone else listens from Monday. Today on Weekly, news reporter Ed Nightingale talks about running a university of his own in Two-Point Campus, which he really liked. And we hear from Christian Donlan about a game I've been really looking forward to, Cult of the Lamb. Spoiler: it's good. But Christian is more excited about the game he's reviewing now - a game called Arcade Paradise. It's a game about running a laundrette but also an arcade within it, which, with time and careful management, will grow into the main attraction. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Cheat maker fires back at Bungie after Destiny 2 copyright infringement case
    Destiny 2 cheat maker AimJunkies has fired back at Bungie, issuing subpoenas to obtain information to back up that its work isn't copyright infringement. Earlier this year, Bungie alleged copyright infringement and breach of contract against AimJunkies for its Destiny 2 "hacks", but the court dismissed much of the case. Bungie was allowed more time to reinstate its case and a few weeks later alleged that AimJunkies had reverse-engineered and copied the software code for Destiny 2. Read more  ( 15 min )
    The video game mop-up: solution to all of life's problems
    Recently I have been in one of those periods where no video game will do, where I have chased a game - a something - across download libraries and subscription catalogues and a couple of cupboard drawers in vain, a quest across gaming's ribcage and shoulder blades for some roaming, ineffable itch that I cannot scratch. I suspect I'm not alone in this one, though, so if you ever find yourself in the same spot, may I suggest: the mop-up. The mop-up has many forms. For me, somewhat uncreatively, it's the task of completing a "living 'dex" in Pokémon - catching one of every Pokémon ever released and storing them all, in order, in one place, including all the many different forms and stages of each evolution. This makes it a bit more long-winded than completing a regular regional or national Pokédex, because you couldn't just catch, say, one Abra and then evolve it into Kadabra, then Alakazam, crossing off all three at once - you need one of each in your possession simultaneously. The challenge is really besides the point, though. A good mop-up, I reckon, will always have a few common elements. One is that it happens, by definition, at the end of a game you've broadly completed - think finishing sidequests, bumping off the last surviving enemies on a given list, wiping the final factions off a map, et cetera. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 Shoothouse inspired map detailed in new video
    Infinity Ward, the team behind Modern Warfare 2, has given us all a little peek at a new map that is coming to the game. The map, which is called Farm 18, was inspired by Modern Warefare's Shoothouse map. "We tried to think of hidden training facilities, but it is also in an industrial cement factory," explained Geoff Smith, the director of multiplayer map design on Modern Warfare 2. Read more  ( 15 min )
    A mobile Avatar: The Last Airbender game is on the way
    A new Avatar game has been announced. No, not that one. This is Avatar: Generations, based on the popular Nickelodeon animated series Avatar: The Last Airbender. (Your release date got pushed back? That's rough, buddy.) The game is being developed by Square Enix London Mobile in partnership with Navigator Games, and is described as a "free-to-play, RPG adventure". At release, the game will follow the main gang (Aang, Katara, Sokka, Toph, Suki, Zuko, Appa and Momo) across the storyline of the series. New stories are promised too, as well as "fan-favourite locations, stories, and events in an open world". Subsequent updates will feature other minor characters from The Last Airbender such as Avatar Kyoshi, as well as characters and storylines from Avatar: The Legend of Korra. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Splatoon 2 players will receive bonuses for transferring save data to Splatoon 3
    Splatoon 2 players will be given bonuses when transferring save data to Splatoon 3. Nintendo's Splatoon 3 Direct earlier this week detailed what's new in the game, but a note on the official website states that save data can be transferred and players will receive in-game rewards for doing so. Apparently "five out of five Squid Research Lab scientists recommend transferring data from Splatoon 2 if you have it". So that's that. Read more  ( 15 min )
    MultiVersus Season One gets new release date
    Following its recent delay, a new release date for Warner Bros.' Smash-like brawler MultiVersus' first season has been announced. Welcomely, the new release date is actually really soon. In fact, it is as soon as 15th August. This also means that Morty will soon be joining the fray. His arrival to the game will be a little after season one's debut, with the new fighter now coming on 23rd August. Read more  ( 15 min )
    What we've been playing
    Hello! Welcome back to our regular feature where we write a little bit about some of the games we've found ourselves playing over the last few days. This time: donuts, imps, and stealth Destiny. If you fancy catching up on some of the older editions of What We've Been Playing, here's our archive. Donut County is a game about controlling a sink hole. You move around encouraging parts of the landscape to fall into it, and over time the hole gets bigger so you can encourage bigger things to fall into it. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Dino park sim Parkasaurus goes aquatic today with new Sea Monsters DLC
    WashBear Studio's charming, thoroughly enjoyable dinosaur park management sim Parkasaurus is looking to wow guests with a whole new, decidedly more acquatic, selection of exhibits from today, 11th August, with the arrival of its new Sea Monsters DLC on PC. Building on Parkasaurus' core management action - which takes obvious inspiration from the likes of Theme Park and DinoPark Tycoon - the new Sea Monsters DLC introduces 11 aquatic reptiles and fish, as well as corresponding flooded enclosures, for players to install on their quest to create the ultimate dino-flavoured tourist attraction. If you're looking for specifics, those new dinos are Elasmosaurus, Plesiosaurus, Mosasaurus, Atopodentatus, Sarcosuchus, Archelon, Dunkleosteus, Liopleurodon, Ichthyosaurus, Placodus, and Megalodon. But Sea Monsters also introduces three new campaign missions, three new biomes, and 20+ exhibit items and hats - all of which will cost £5.19/$6.99 USD on Steam. Read more  ( 15 min )
  • Open

    Meta iOS apps accused of injecting code into third-party websites
    Company insists it's doing so 'to honor people’s App Tracking Transparency (ATT) choices' Meta's Instagram and Facebook apps on iOS devices have been injecting JavaScript code into third-party websites from their custom in-app browser, gaining access to data that would be unavailable were those pages loaded in a stand-alone, WebKit-based iOS browser.…  ( 6 min )
    Twitter unveils US midterm election integrity plans, upsets almost everyone
    Don't feed the trolls? Users deem policy an attack on conservatives, dystopian, and election manipulation Twitter has announced its plans to fight misinformation during the 2022 US midterm elections, including activating its Civic Integrity Policy (CIP).…  ( 5 min )
    US reveals 'Target' pic of Conti man with $10m reward offer
    Fashion Police chipping in on the bounty related to costliest strain of ransomware on record The US government is putting a face on a claimed member of the infamous Conti ransomware group as part of a $10 million reward for information about five of the gang's crew.…  ( 5 min )
    Scientists find gasses from Earth in rocks from early Moon
    The discovery could help scientists further understand the origins of life Moon meteorites found on Earth contain trace gasses that lend further support to the widely held belief that our largest natural satellite formed from chunks of our planet that were ejected in a massive impact.…  ( 4 min )
    Microsoft trumps Google for 2021-22 bug bounty payouts
    Another $13.7m handed out to researchers, but then again it does have an awful lot of attack surfaces Microsoft appears to have beat Google on the bug bounty front, with $13.7 million in rewards spread out over 335 researchers.…  ( 5 min )
    AWS takes a shot at the private 5G network
    Well, more like 4G LTE right now, and you'll probably need someone to put up the radio Amazon Web Services has waded into the private mobile network marketplace with AWS Private 5G.…  ( 4 min )
    BT union announces 48-hour strike action in protest over pay
    26,000 engineers and call center operators to down tools again this month The union representing upset BT workers has served notice on the one-time UK state owned telco that tens of thousands of engineers and call center operators will down tools for two more days of strikes this month.…  ( 5 min )
    Ubuntu 22.04.1: Slightly late, but worth the upgrade
    Latest shine on the Jammy Jellyfish brings ton of fixes to keep you working smoothly The first point-release of the newest Ubuntu is here, which marks the stage it formally becomes the new long-term-support release.…  ( 5 min )
    Intel ups protection against physical chip attacks in Alder Lake
    Repurposes logic originally used for spotting variations in voltage, timing in older circuits to help performance Black Hat  Intel has disclosed how it may be able to protect systems against some physical threats by repurposing circuitry originally designed to counter variations in voltage and timing that may occur as silicon circuits age.…  ( 5 min )
    Google fined $42.5m over misleading Android location settings in Australia
    Ad behemoth committed to 'providing the most helpful products possible' Google is being ordered to pay A$60 million ($42.5 million) in penalties to Australia's competition and national consumer law regulator regarding the collection and use of location data on Android phones.…  ( 5 min )
    Emergency services call-handling provider: Ransomware forced it to pull servers offline
    Advanced's infrastructure still down and out, recovery to take weeks or more Advanced, the MSP forced to shut down some of its servers last week after identifying an "issue" with its infrastructure hosting products, has confirmed a ransomware attack and says recovery will be in the order of weeks.…  ( 5 min )
    Microsoft: Outlook desktop app crashing due to missing identity setting
    A new Windows esport event: Opening Outlook Outlook sometimes goes wrong and even Microsoft occasionally can't work out why, judging by a freshly published Microsoft 365 support article.…  ( 4 min )
    Our software is perfect. If something has gone wrong, it must be YOUR fault
    Hello customer, can I help you? Ha ha, just kidding, of course I won’t Something for the Weekend  "That's it! I've had enough of this! I'm leaving!"…  ( 8 min )
    Microsoft open-sources its emojis as part of new design philosophy
    No Clippy, though, and that philosophy only seems to go so far Microsoft open-sourced most of its emoji library this week.…  ( 4 min )
    'I wonder what this cable does': How to tell thicknet from a thickhead
    Termin-what? Why can't I connect directly to the network On Call  Is a Loose Cannon worse than a Big Cheese? What happens when the two are combined? Stir in some overconfidence and you have today's entry in the On Call archives.…  ( 5 min )
    Asteroids may shoot pebbles into shallow temporary orbits, boffins believe
    OSIRIS-Rex saw this happening. An odd meteorite suggests why and how In 2019, scientists clocked something they'd never seen before: an asteroid named Bennu appeared to be popping off swarms of pebbles. Research published Thursday may go some way to explain why.…  ( 4 min )
    US military fuels eVTOL research with $75M contract
    The renewed agreement more than doubles the DoD's deal with Joby Aviation A flying taxi company with plans to take to the skies by 2024 has just received a $45 million cash infusion from the United States Department of Defense to explore military applications.…  ( 5 min )
    After eleven-year wait, Atlassian customers promised custom domains in 2023
    Some got so cranky waiting they made a t-shirt celebrating the 'CLOUD-6999' Jira ticket On July 8, 2011, Atlassian Cloud posted a Jira ticket titled "Allow custom domains for Cloud apps".…  ( 4 min )
    VMware offers cloudy upgrade lifeline to legacy vCenter users
    But warns 'upcoming major release of vSphere' will break some plugins It's not often that a double dot release of a product adds significant functionality, but VMware did just that on Thursday with version 4.4.1 of its Cloud Director Availability product, which adds the ability to migrate aged and unsupported versions of vCenter to the cloud.…  ( 4 min )
    Court voids 34,000 unfair Fuji Xerox contracts
    Required customers to pay for software they did not receive, among other sins Australia’s Federal Court has voided 34,000 contracts that Fuji Xerox’s local outposts offered to local small business customers, after they were found to be unfair in many ways.…  ( 4 min )
    FAANGs failing on keeping user data safe from bug hunters
    Time to call in the legal team Black Hat  Dylan Ayrey, a bug hunter and CEO of Truffle Security, discovered a big data company credential dump containing personal information belonging to about 50,000 of its users, and still hasn't fixed it. …  ( 5 min )
    FTC ponders proper punishment for commercial data 'surveillance' and shoddy security
    Got thoughts on the online panopticon? The FTC wants to hear The US Federal Trade Commission on Thursday announced an effort to formulate privacy rules to deter unwelcome online monitoring and shoddy data security.…  ( 6 min )
    Higher risks and premiums are creating critical gap in cyber insurance
    Most organizations don’t have the financial resources necessary to address ransomware and other cyberattacks, BlackBerry says Black Hat  Many organizations are increasingly unprepared to deal with the skyrocketing costs of a ransomware attacks, at a time when the number of incidents and the payments demanded by cybercriminals are rising rapidly.…  ( 5 min )
    Security needs to learn from the aviation biz to avoid crashing
    'Until someone has to go to jail for doing it wrong the teeth are not going to be the same' Black Hat video  The security industry needs to take a leaf from the manual of an industry where smart incident response is literally life and death, if it is to fix systemic problems.…  ( 5 min )
    Scientists unveil a physics-defying curved space robot
    It can move without anything to push off from, but only via curved spacetime A team of scientists from Georgia Tech say they've built a robot that can move without anything to push against - a discovery that seems to violate the law of conservation momentum. …  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Asus ROG Swift OLED monitor hands-on: bright, bold windows into a possible PC gaming future
    If you’ve drooled over the OLED panel in your phone or TV and decided you’d like the same tech for your PC games, you basically have the choice of a single model each from Gigabyte and Alienware. Asus, then, are about to increase the number of OLED gaming monitors on the market by 100%, with the ROG Swift PG48UQ and ROG Swift PG42UQ. And I’ve just had a brief, but generally impressive, play around with them. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Space For Sale is a sandbox space builder that looks like alien Animal Crossing
    Of the many games announced during THQ Nordic's Showcase this evening, Space For Sale is the one that caught my eye the most, primarily because it looks a bit like Animal Crossing with aliens. In it, you play a small stubby astronaut who dreams of hitting it big as an intergalactic property developer. Man, they really took the phrase 'colony sim' to its literal extreme, didn't they? Are we sure that isn't Tom Nook under the helmet there? The proportions defintiely seem right, is all I'm saying. I just hope the rent you end up charging isn't... astronommical. Sorry. Here's the reveal trailer. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Alone In The Dark returns to Derceto Manor in new reimagining of the 90s horror classic
    Surprise! Survival horror series Alone In The Dark returns - again! This time it's a reimagining of the original 1992 game, where you'll delve into Derceto Manor as returning characters Emily Hartwood and Edward Carnby in an attempt to figure out what's happened to Hartwood's missing uncle. As you'd expect, it does not go terribly well. But hey, it looks like it makes for a pretty good time. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Burnout meets Hot Wheels in new sandbox racer Wreckreation
    Three Fields Entertainment are responsible for lots of games with "dangerous" in their title: Dangerous Driving, Danger Zone, and Dangerous Golf. But now they've got a new racing game in the works which eschews their previous naming convention for something that'll make you say with a wry smile and a shake of the head, "I see what you did there". It's called Wreckreation (you know, like 'recreation', not Wreck-reaction, or Wreck–eation) and its reveal trailer looks a bit like if Burnout and Hot Wheels went for a joyride together. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Ghostrunner devs next game is a retro-inspired RTS base builder
    What qualifies as a "next-gen" RTS game? Is it shinier graphics? More in-depth tactical choices? Well, Ghostrunner and Graven devs Slipgate Ironworks hope to provide an answer with their latest real-time tactics base-building game, Tempest Rising. Revealed earlier this evening during THQ Nordic's summer showcase, Tempest Rising is a retro-inspired strategy game where you'll take control of three factions fighting for a rare mineral. And yep, that mineral is called 'Tempest'. Here's the reveal trailer. Read more  ( 18 min )
    I think my cats hate video games, and I'm absolutely devastated
    As many of you well know, I rather enjoyed cat adventure Stray recently. As an owner of two tortoiseshells myself, it was right up my alley. I do, however, have a confession to make. When I started seeing other real life cats enjoying the game alongside their respective humans, I began to feel sad and a bit left out. You see, my cats Maple and Midna (still!) haven't shown any interest in Stray whatsoever, not even flicking up their ears in response to the cat's in-game meow. I'm not gonna lie, it kinda broke my heart a little bit. However, I'm beginning to think their (clear and apparent) hatred of video games goes further than simple disinterest. I was playing A Plague Tale: Requiem for the first time last week, a game famous for its swarms of screeching rats, and STILL nothing. They love hunting rats and bringing them home to leave as little presents for us on our back door step. Heck, they'll even wig out and go into prowl mode when they hear them scrabbling away underneath our floorboards (yes, we do have a rat problem in our house). But clearly, their ice cold little murder hearts are unmoved by their video game equivalents. Is this what it's like when your children reject your hobbies and go and sulk in their rooms for the rest of the day? Because it sure does feel like it. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Zapling Bygone's tentacly skull-stealing hivemind is... kind of neat?
    "Metroidvania" is a terrible phrase that gets in the way of its own definition and I hate it. It does, however, still apply to Zapling Bygone. Describing it in less mechanical terms could make it sound creepy. You're a spore of an all-consuming hivemind, dropped on an unfamiliar planet to assimilate it. You move by skittering about on wobbly green tentacles, leaping and climbing and clinging and lashing out at living things with them, then absorbing the green muck that bursts out, and periodically consuming a creature powerful enough to be worth assimilating. And wearing its skull in the centre of your tentacle mass, because why not. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Isometric turn-based RPG Metal Slug Tactics delayed into 2023
    Turn-based tactical RPG Metal Slug Tactics has been delayed. Saying that "the squad needs a bit more time in the shop to prepare for the battles ahead," the publisher has announced that it'll now be coming out in 2023. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Infinity Ward shares a peek at upcoming Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 map Farm 18
    Infinity Ward have shared a small peek at an upcoming Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 map, Farm 18. The TikTok mostly gives some design details from a couple of the developers who worked on it, but does also show about five seconds of gameplay at the beginning. Read more  ( 16 min )
    2D Souls-like Moonscars slashes into stores in September
    Pixel art Souls-like Moonscars has announced that it'll be releasing on September 27th. Protagonist Grey Irma will set off into a gorgeous world to search for the sculptor who made her and find answers to her existence. And also to absolutely whack some monsters with a gigantic sword along the way. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Humble's Resident Evil bundle nets you 11 Resi games for £25
    With the Netflix Resident Evil series going down like a blood-filled lead balloon, you may be thinking it's high time you revisited the Resident Evil games to wipe the show from your memory banks. Handily, Humble have a pretty good Resident Evil bundle going on right now, which nets you 11 Resident Evil games - including the excellent Resident Evil 2 Remake and Resident Evil 7 - for a very agreeable £24.70. It runs from now until August 24th, and is raising money in support of charity Direct Relief and their efforts to help the people of Ukraine. Read more  ( 17 min )
    MultiVersus' delayed season one and battle pass are coming next week
    Crossover fanfiction Smash-like MultiVersus has announced that its previously delayed season one and battle pass will be launching on Monday, August 15th. Morty, also previously delayed, will be making his debut on August 23rd, and other new additions are planned throughout the season. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Tower Of Fantasy bug squishes characters until they're 2D
    Players checking out anime gacha MMO Tower Of Fantasy have been running into some strange bugs. Though the server issues that were being experienced at launch seem to be mostly fixed, other glitches are now being uncovered, not least of which is the ability to turn your character into a cartoon character who fell underneath a steamroller. Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    An Alone in the Dark reboot is coming from the Soma and Amnesia: Dark Descent writer
    At today's THQ Nordic 2022 Digital Showcase, developer Pieces Interactive announced an Alone in the Dark reboot, due to release on PS5, Xbox Series X, and PC. There's no release date yet, but in a behind-closed-doors preview event, we were told the game is currently in 'pre-alpha' – so don't expect it anytime soon (though it has been in development since 'late 2019'). THQ Nordic's executive producer Michael Paeck says that recent games (like the Resident Evil remakes, Silent Hill titles, and Dead Space) go for ‘terror’ more than 'horror', and the team wants this new title to go back to what made the original 1992 Alone in the Dark special. The team constantly referred to the dense, rich atmosphere of the first game, and how much it wants to recreate that in this new game – some 30 years after the original launched. From a debut trailer we've seen so far, the game seems similar to the Resident Evil remakes Capcom has seen so much success with. It's a complete rethink of the first game, with the SOMA and Amnesia: Dark Descent writer, Mikael Hedberg, coming in to head up the narrative on the the project. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Save data from Splatoon 2 can be transferred to Splatoon 3
    Did you know that save data from Splatoon 2 can be transferred to Splatoon 3? Well, now you know. And there's even better news: according to the official Splatoon 3 website, you will also receive save data bonuses. You can transfer save data once per Nintendo Account by launching Splatoon 3 or entering the lobby while connected to the internet. To transfer, and save data from Splatoon 2 must be on the same system with the same user account. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Attention all Netflix subscribers: Please, use your excellent free games before they’re taken away from you
    No-one is playing Netflix’s games. Well, no, that’s not true – 1% of Netflix subscribers are. But that means that over 200 million people have access to, say, one of the best strategy games out there… and probably don’t even know about it. For the more casual players, interested in less intensive and more cosy affairs, there’s the likes of Poinpy, Krispee Street, and Knittens. If you’re a nut for Stranger Things and have been humming Running Up That Hill and Master of Puppets since the one-two punch of those musical finales, you’ll probably find the likes of Stranger Things 3: The Game and Stranger Things: 1984 both worth your time. But the odds are you don’t even know these games are available as part of your subscription fee. Until I started writing this piece, I didn’t even know how difficult it was to access the games on various platforms – Netflix hasn’t exactly been communicative about promoting them to its still-humongus user base, has it? To make matters more complicated, you can’t play the games via the app, but instead you need to head to the mobile store of your platform of choice (iOS or Android) and download the games from there. Anything viable with your Netflix subscription will be indicated with that trademark red N logo , and listed via a dedicated in-app tab on the homescreen. Clicking that – or finding a relevant game in your storefront of choice – will prompt a Netflix log-in, and from there you can play the game. For free. Read more  ( 18 min )
    Remember PT? Kojima definitely does
    Hideo Kojima took to Twitter just under an hour ago, and if you were simply doom-scrolling and not reading, you might've felt your heart skip a beat if you're a horror fan. No, Kojima is not sharing any teasers from his upcoming horror project with Xbox. He simply shared the P.T. artwork again. Again, no, there's no new P.T. announcements. It isn't coming back from the dead. In fact, it still isn't even downloadable anywhere unless you're tracking it – or its clones - down by nefarious means. Kojima tweeted that "It's been 8 years", and, well, he isn't wrong. It's been eight years since what could've been the best Silent Hill game – a complete revival for the Konami series from Metal Gear Solid's best – was robbed from us. Fortunately for me, who will not stop rambling on about P.T. and the loss of Silent Hills for the life of me, I've been reminded that I'm not alone. Read more  ( 16 min )
    League of Legends 2023 preseason jungle changes are coming with... pets?
    In case you didn't see the sneaky League of Legends leaks that slipped out yesterday, you may be surprised to hear that the jungle role is set to undergo some major changes during the 2023 Pre-season. This includes aids for jungle pathing, jungle camp leashing, and jungle pets which appear to be the answer to stale itemisation in the role. According to the official release for this update, jungle was a role that was actively avoided by a significant number of players. While the goal apparently isn’t to dumb down the role, some areas of difficulty are being reworked to remove this barrier of entry and allow for greater skill expression in other areas. Let start with the pets - by a large margin the most brow-raising addition to the role. While the folks at Riot Games aren’t giving up details on how exactly these will work, we know they’re an answer to the bland blue smite / red smite itemisation. This is being added to make the process of killing jungle camps a bit more exciting - rather than make it a practice of dull minion farming. Read more  ( 16 min )
    PS Plus Premium’s August update is good, bad, and ugly
    Earlier this week, we heard about the next batch of games coming to bulk out the PlayStation Plus Extra and Premium tiers on Sony’s newly dressed-up subscription service. At first glance, it’s not a bad offering – for owners of PS Plus Extra, you'll be able to pick up three different Yakuza titles (including the best one, Yakuza 0) – but beyond that, there are some glaring issues with this month’s rollout. Sure, these three triple-A RPG games are a fantastic entry point for anyone jostling to get into the series for the first time. You can even come in at the ground floor, play Yakuza 0, and get to know gangland heartthrob Kazuma Kiryu and his stomping grounds of Kabukichō. For the sake of the headline at the top of this piece, this is Good. Being able to play the first three full chapters of the Yakuza series (with the promise of the rest of the saga to come to PS Plus later) is objectively Good. There is nothing Bad, or indeed Ugly, about that. It’s moves like this that keep PS Plus a viable rival to Xbox Game Pass, and halt critics of the service calling it ‘a disaster’. Read more  ( 17 min )
    VG247's The Best Games Ever Podcast – Ep.12: Best game that you hated for a very specific reason
    Disclaimer: For legal reasons some of the names of the people involved in this story have been altered. ”Steve,” exclaimed the supply teacher, Miss Personality Vacuum. ”Yes, Miss,” replied Steve. Read more  ( 18 min )
    MultiVersus Season 1 start date confirmed for next week, Morty coming later
    It's been a fairly bumpy road, but finally we have a solid release date for the first proper season of Multiversus: August 15. A statement from the game's official account over on Twitter confirmed the new release date for the multiplatform, Smash-like fighting game, and noted that the next character – the eponymous Morty from Rick and Morty – will be available from August 23. “We’re excited to announce Season 1 will begin on August 15 with a brand-new Battle Pass for you to earn in-game rewards!” says a tweet announcing the new date. “We can also confirm Morty will join the character roster on August 23 as part of Season 1. We look forward to sharing more in the coming weeks!” Read more  ( 16 min )
    Kirby's Dream Buffet is all about inhaling sweet treats, and releases next week
    After Kirby made their grand 3D debut with Kirby and The Forgotten Land, Kirby fans just can't get enough of the positively pink puff ball. So, Nintendo have given keen fans like me exactly what they want in the form of Kirby's Dream Buffet, which has finally had its release date revealed. In a tweet from Nintendo of America, a three-minute gameplay trailer for the title has been shown off, and the release date has been announced for 17 August, 2022. That's just next week! Needless to say, Kirby's 30th Anniversary has gone down a treat this year, and what better way to celebrate than with a game that lets Kirby and friends eat just as many treats as they want and deserve? Read more  ( 16 min )
  • Open

    FFmpeg Begins Integrating Intel oneVPL Support
    Intel has contributed support for their oneVPL open-source video processing library to the upstream FFmpeg project for that widely-used, cross-platform multimedia library...  ( 5 min )
    Intel Preps HWMON Support For Linux Driver To Expose Power / Voltage / Energy Reporting
    While much of the Intel Arc Graphics "Alchemist" (DG2) support appears squared away for Linux 6.0 besides the support still being hidden behind the flag requiring i915.force_probe= to actually enable the experimental support, there still are various DG2 discrete GPU features being tackled by the open-source Intel kernel graphics drivers. One of those "extras" still working its way to the kernel is HWMON subsystem integration to be able to expose power / voltage / energy reporting...  ( 5 min )
    Radeon Pro Software For Enterprise 22.Q2 For Linux Released
    Released in June was the Radeon PRO Software for Enterprise 21.Q2 to deliver AMD's enterprise-vetted graphics driver stack to Windows users. Meanwhile recently debuting is the long-awaited adjacent Radeon Pro Software for Enterprise for Linux driver update...  ( 5 min )
    AMD Posts Linux Audio Driver For The "Pink Sardine"
    The colorful fishy codenames are not over for AMD's Linux driver crew! While on the GPU side they have moved to IP block-by-block enablement strategy for their future GPUs, over on the audio co-processor side AMD posted a series of patches today under the "Pink Sardine" codename...  ( 5 min )
    Mesa 22.2 Gaming Performance With Radeon RX 6700/6800 XT Graphics Cards On Linux
    With Mesa 22.2 bringing many new features, you may be curious about how the performance of this next Mesa3D release is looking. For your viewing pleasure today are benchmarks of Mesa 22.2 back from the day it was branched against that of the stock Mesa 22.0 on Ubuntu 22.04 if you have been wondering whether it's worthwhile upgrading... Benchmarks for this article from the current-generation Radeon RX 6700 XT and RX 6800 XT graphics cards.  ( 4 min )
    F2FS Low-Memory Mode, Atomic Write Improvements For Linux 6.0
    The Flash Friendly File-System (F2FS) continues showing its a formidable file-system option for flash memory devices, especially SSDs and mobile hardware. With Linux 6.0 there are yet more improvements for this file-system driver...  ( 4 min )
    Zink Squeezes Some More Performance Optimizations In Mesa 22.2 For OpenGL On Vulkan
    Valve contractor Mike Blumenkrantz who works on Zink for OpenGL implemented atop Vulkan has managed some more performance optimizations with the upcoming Mesa 22.2 quarterly feature release...  ( 5 min )
    Intel's Clear Linux Taps -O3 For Its Kernel Builds
    While Intel's performance-optimized Clear Linux rolling-release distribution is known for its aggressive performance optimizations, their kernel build had been going with the default "-O2" optimization but last week did switch over to rolling their kernel with -O3...  ( 4 min )
    LoongArch Enables PCI & Other Features For Linux 6.0
    While support for the loongArch Chinese CPU architecture was merged in Linux 5.19, it wasn't actually enough to yield a booting system due to some driver code not yet being finished and ready for merging in time. LoongArch was allowed to merge that preliminary code in v5.19 so the Glibc support could land and now for Linux 6.0 more of the CPU port is ready to hit the kernel...  ( 5 min )
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    Poliovirus detected in NYC sewage; health officials urge vaccination
    Meanwhile, officials in London reported finding poliovirus over 100 times in sewage.  ( 6 min )
    LG plans to introduce 20-inch OLED panels this year
    The smallest consumer OLED TV LG makes currently measures 42 inches.  ( 5 min )
    How to upgrade to Windows 11, whether your PC is supported or not
    Supported or not, new or old, this is everything you need to know.  ( 10 min )
    Betelgeuse is bouncing back after blowing its top in 2019
    "We're watching stellar evolution in real time."  ( 6 min )
    Xiaomi clones the Galaxy Fold, makes it 40% thinner, adds a bigger battery
    Samsung hasn't changed the Galaxy Fold battery density for four years, and it shows.  ( 5 min )
    US approves Google plan to let political emails bypass Gmail spam filter
    Plan came after GOP complaints, but FEC says it doesn't violate ban on contributions.  ( 5 min )
    The Soviet Union once hunted endangered whales to the brink of extinction
    Scientists opposed whaling and secretly tracked its toll.  ( 5 min )
    Epson’s bricked printers highlight the industry’s reparability problem
    Printer makers have a history of invasive practices that hurt user repairability, experience.  ( 6 min )
    Samsung heir pardoned due to South Korean economic needs
    Lee's ascendancy to Samsung chairman position key to "vitalizing the economy."  ( 5 min )
    Google adds instant cloud-streaming button to web searches for games
    It's not just Stadia, either; non-Google streaming rivals also get featured.  ( 5 min )
    Rocket Report: SpaceX sees rideshare demand, Russia’s odd launch deal with Iran
    "One of the questions that we’re getting a lot is, 'How full are you guys?'"  ( 7 min )
    The best cheap Android phones
    Want a smartphone but don't want to spend $1,000? We've got you covered.  ( 8 min )
    CDC no longer gently recommends COVID precautions most weren’t following anyway
    Unvaccinated people no longer need to quarantine and physical distancing is de-emphasized.  ( 6 min )
    I’m a security reporter and got fooled by a blatant phish
    Think you're too smart to be fooled by a phisher? Think again.  ( 6 min )
    Amazon studio plans lighthearted show of Ring surveillance footage
    Company with notable footage-sharing issues wants to do it more, but funny.  ( 5 min )
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    Shirish Agarwal: Mum and Books
    The last day The first lesson I would like everybody to know and have is to buy two machines, especially a machine to check low blood pressure. I had actually ordered one from Amazon but they never delivered. I hope to sue them in consumer court in due course of time. The other one is a blood sugar machine which I ordered and did get, but the former is more important than the latter, and the reason why will be known soon. Mum had stopped eating solids and was entirely on liquids for the last month of her life. I did try enticing her however I could with aromatic food but failed. Add to that we had weird weather this entire year. June is supposed to be when the weather turns and we have gentle showers, but this whole June it felt like we were in an oven. She asked for liquids whenever…  ( 17 min )
    Wouter Verhelst: Upgrading a Windows 10 VM to Windows 11
    I run Debian on my laptop (obviously); but occasionally, for $DYAJOB, I have some work to do on Windows. In order to do so, I have had a Windows 10 VM in my libvirt configuration that I can use. A while ago, Microsoft issued Windows 11. I recently found out that all the components for running Windows 11 inside a libvirt VM are available, and so I set out to upgrade my VM from Windows 10 to Windows 11. This wasn't as easy as I thought, so here's a bit of a writeup of all the things I ran against, and how I fixed them. Windows 11 has a number of hardware requirements that aren't necessary for Windows 10. There are a number of them, but the most important three are: Secure Boot is required (Windows 10 would still boot on a machine without Secure Boot, although buying hardware without at least…  ( 5 min )
    Guido Günther: On a road to Prizren with a Free Software Phone
    Since people are sometimes slightly surprised that you can go onto a multi week trip with a smartphone running free sofware so only I wanted to share some impressions from my recent trip to Prizren/Kosovo to attend Debconf 22 using a Librem 5. It's a mix of things that happend and bits that got improved to hopefully make things more fun to use. And, yes, there won't be any big surprises like being stranded without the ability to do phone calls in this read because there weren't and there shouldn't be. After two online versions Debconf 22 (the annual Debian Conference) took place in Prizren / Kosovo this year and I sure wanted to go. Looking for options I settled for a train trip to Vienna, to meet there with friends and continue the trip via bus to Zagreb, then switching to a final 11h dir…  ( 4 min )
    Ben Hutchings: Debian LTS work, July 2022
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    Cult of the Lamb släppt och betygen är riktigt, riktigt bra
    Kanske något för Spelhelgen™?  ( 6 min )
    Det här spelar FZ i helgen - vad spelar du?
    Covidkur, tok-action och kära återbesök. Hur ser dina spelplaner ut?  ( 6 min )
    Spider-Man Remastered - Se gameplay från pc-versionen
    Vi lirar det uppsnyggade Spidde-spelet.  ( 6 min )
    Geoff Keighley om Gamescoms öppningsshow: räkna med överraskningar
    23 augusti är det dags.  ( 6 min )
    FZ Play - Spider-Man Remastered på pc
    Brottsbekämpningen börjar klockan 20.  ( 5 min )
    Gotham Knights visar sitt Gotham City, betydligt större än i något Arkham-spel
    No content preview  ( 6 min )
    Diskutera - Spelbranschens värsta pr-katastrofer
    Usla presentationer som dödat hypen för ett spel - berätta vilka du minns.  ( 6 min )
    21.00 i kväll - se THQ Nordic Digital Showcase visa nytt
    No content preview  ( 6 min )
    Metal Slug Tactics försenas till 2023
    Den sjätte förseningen vi skriver om i augusti.  ( 6 min )
    Path of Exile-expansion släpps nästa vecka - Path of Exile 2-betatest sommaren 2023
    Gratis som vanligt.  ( 6 min )
    Svenska Thunderfuls vd avgår efter mångmiljonförlust
    Minus 21 miljoner kronor på ett kvartal.  ( 6 min )
    Det lovande PvE-överlevnadsspelet Nightingale försenas till nästa år
    För att uppgradera till Unreal Engine 5.  ( 6 min )
    Jaktspelet Way of the Hunter får en videogenomgång inför släppet
    16 augusti är det dags att utforska 180 kilometer jaktmark.  ( 6 min )
    David Braben slutar som VD för Elite-utvecklaren Frontier Developments
    Men stannar hos företaget.  ( 6 min )
    Ta en videofärd genom Total War: Warhammer 3:s massiva Immortal Empires-karta
    En 13 minuter lång genomgång av platser och fraktioner.  ( 6 min )
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    AMD RDNA 3 GPU Specs: Up To 12,288 ALUs, 96MB Infinity Cache
    Angstronomics reveals the potential specifications for AMD's looming RDNA 3 silicon.  ( 59 min )
    New X-NAND Technology Doubles Flash Write Speeds
    Gen 2 X-NAND technology may increase the throughput of our SSDs at no extra cost, according to a California company.  ( 59 min )
    Intel's Tunable Replica Circuit Tech Uses Telemetry to Detect Cyberattacks
    Intel develops Tunable Replica Circuit technology to prevent non-invasive physical glitch attacks.  ( 59 min )
    AMD's Ryzen 7000 Mobile Pink Sardine APUs Are In The Works
    A new codename from AMD known as Pink Sardine has emerged in Linux. The codename may correspond to AMD's upcoming Ryzen 7000 Phoenix mobile APUs.  ( 59 min )
    XMG Unveils New Ryzen 9 6900HX, RTX 3080 Ti Gaming Laptop
    New laptops from German firm XMG include Ryzen 9 CPUs and external liquid cooling.  ( 63 min )
    Intel Arc A380 Overclocks to 3.1 GHz, 55% Faster Than Stock
    It clocked at 3.1 GHz but consumed only 17.4W. It is a telltale sign that a volt-mod is behind the impressive 55% overclock compared to the stock 75W Arc A380 graphics card.  ( 59 min )
    Raspberry Pi Pico Used in Plug and Play System Monitor
    Dmytro Panin uses a Raspberry Pi Pico to monitor MacBook stats by outputting data to a Pimoroni Pico Display Pack module.  ( 62 min )
    AMD's EPYC 9654 96-Core Genoa CPU Pictured as Launch Is Looming
    AMD's final 96-core EPYC 9654 'Genoa' processors are presumably shipping to the company's partners.  ( 59 min )
    Mingda Magician Pro Review: More Bed, More Magic
    Mingda’s Magician Pro is an easy to use printer with a massive build volume.  ( 64 min )
    LG DualUp 28MQ780 Monitor Review: A Unique New Display Shape
    LG brings a new screen shape to the market with its 28-inch DualUp 28MQ780. It’s a 16:18-aspect IPS panel with 2560x2880 pixels, HDR and a wide color gamut. It’s the same as stacking two 21-inch screens vertically, except there’s no line in the middle.  ( 70 min )
    Russian-Made Baikal M1-Based Laptop Shows Up in Pre-Production
    Pre-Production BitBlaze Titan notebook based on Russian Baikal-M CPU demonstrated.  ( 60 min )
    Desktop CPU Sales Lowest in 30 Years, AMD Gains Market Share Anyway
    AMD makes big gains in desktop, mobile and server CPU markets.  ( 65 min )
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    Nyhetssammanfattning: Intel Arc, Nvidias priser och Samsungs vikbara drömmar
    Studion ekar tom denna fredag, men för den som vill skaffa sig en bild av veckans tekniknyheter sammanfattar @wittwang ett enkelt fredagspanelssubstitut.  ( 8 min )
    Sårbarhet hos Intels färska arkitekturer uppdagas
    Säkerhetsfunktionen SGX är inte helt säker hos arkitekturerna "Ice Lake" och "Alder Lake", där skyddad data kan läsas på grund av en bugg.  ( 6 min )
    Samsung: "År 2025 är vikbara standard i premiumsegmentet"
    Höga priser och mindre beprövad teknik avskräcker nog många från att hoppa på det vikbara tåget, men inom tre år tror Samsung att detta har vänt.  ( 6 min )
    Studie visar att energisnåla SSD-enheter har större miljöpåverkan än hårddiskar
    En energiintensiv produktionsfas kompenserar för det lägre effektuttaget SSD-enheter har vid drift, men studien förbiser och förenklar ett antal parametrar.  ( 6 min )
    Optimal minnesfrekvens för Ryzen 7000 kan bli 6 000 MHz
    Rykten pekar på en maximal frekvens för Infinity Fabric på 3 000 MHz för den kommande AMD Ryzen 7000-serien och tillhörande AM5-moderkort.  ( 6 min )
    Intels Arc-satsning blöder pengar – analysfirma förordar nedläggning
    I en artikel beskriver Jon Peddie Research hur Intels stora investeringar inte lyckas bära frukt, och att handlingskraftige Pat Gelsinger borde agera.  ( 7 min )
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    Force Feed
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    Untitled
    No content preview  ( 2 min )
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    yuzu the Nintendo Switch Emulator gets an easy Linux installer
    Good news for Linux and Steam Deck fans, the yuzu team have worked to bring the installer for the Nintendo Switch Emulator over to Linux properly.  ( 4 min )
    Retro racer Horizon Chase Turbo gets a big free Adventures game mode
    Horizon Chase Turbo is a very highly rated retro racing game from developer AQUIRIS and today it sees a huge free upgrade.  ( 4 min )
    Hollow Knight is getting cross-platform Steam Cloud Saves to help Steam Deck
    Hollow Knight developer Team Cherry has announced that an update due to go live on Monday, August 15th will bring a much needed change to the saving system.  ( 4 min )
    Valheim gets a small teaser as Iron Gate get back to work on Mistlands
    Valheim is due to get a huge upgrade at some point, which most players are now waiting on and Iron Gate have given the smallest of teasers on it again.  ( 4 min )
    Get loads of Resident Evil in the latest Humble Bundle
    Love Resident Evil and want to get a whole lot of it? Humble Bundle have put up the Resident Evil Decades of Horror bundle and it's a pretty full collection.  ( 4 min )
    Steam Deck got a few Beta updates recently so here's what's new
    While I was briefly away camping, Valve released a few Steam Deck Beta updates so here's a round-up of what's new in case you also missed it.  ( 4 min )
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    My New Comic Series
    I HAVE A SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT! It’s been one year since the duck made his first appearance with the burnout storyline, and now I’m proud to finally launch the beginning of Plucked Up as an ongoing slice-of-life comic series!  ( 1 min )
    Plucked Up: Nice Day
    The beginning of my new slice-of-life comic series!  ( 1 min )
  • Open

    5 Tools to Protect Your Email Address From Websites and Newsletters
    You can use these tools to get dummy email addresses to share with third parties. Your actual email address is not exposed.  ( 25 min )
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    Comic for 2022.08.12 - Imagine Dragons
    New Cyanide and Happiness Comic  ( 5 min )
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    Coffee Cup Holes
    No content preview  ( 1 min )

  • Open

    Nvidia's GeForce GTX 2080 Prototype Shows Up In The Wild
    Out of nowhere, a "GTX 2080" prototype has surfaced online. It gives us a clue that Nvidia was considering extending its GTX 16 series lineup into an 80 series product.  ( 59 min )
    YMTC Ships Xtacking 2.0 3D NAND PCIe 4.0 SSDs Up to 6.2 GBps
    YMTC starts shipments of enterprise-grade PE310 PCIe Gen4 U.2 SSDs with Xtacking 2.0 3D NAND.  ( 59 min )
    Raspberry Pi Pico DAQ PCB Turns Microcontroller into Oscilloscope
    Alperen Akküncü has created a custom PCB that turns the Raspberry Pi Pico into a DAQ 4-channel oscilloscope tool.  ( 62 min )
    Cooler Master Launches Airflow-Focused PC Cases With Aggressive Front Ends
    Cooler Master reveals two new cases in its CMP lineup, featuring front mesh panels and ARGB fans.  ( 62 min )
    Ethereum Testnet Success Paves Way for 'The Merge' in September
    Ethereum today successfully transited its last testnet, Goerli, towards the final code to be implemented in mainnet. The software update to Ethereum's Virtual Machine will enable the transition to Proof-of-Stake, besides other upgrades.  ( 59 min )
    Revamped MemTest86 Can Highlight Bad ICs on Your DIMMs
    Highlighting precise DRAM chip error locations could open up repair and salvage options. Only works on Intel Alder Lake DDR5 and Z690 platforms for now.  ( 59 min )
    Go Big With Dells 34-Inch S3422DWG For $389: Real Deals
    If you want to play games or watch Netflix on a massive 34-inch screen, Dell's S3422DWG monitor for $389 is a fantastic option. Back down to its Prime Day sales price, this is the cheapest we've seen this widescreen beast.  ( 65 min )
    AMD's Encoder Tweaks Rival Nvidia, But Intel's AV1 Reigns Supreme
    AMD recently updated its AMF H.264 encoder with a new feature called Pre-Analysis, this feature boosts video quality equal to that of Nvidia's Turing and Ampere-based NVENC encoder.  ( 61 min )
    Razer DeathAdder V3 Pro Review: Practically Perfect Design
    Razer’s DeathAdder V3 Pro is a lightweight wireless gaming mouse that’s highly customizable and incredibly ergonomic.  ( 67 min )
    Chinese Trade Groups: CHIPS Act and Science Law Hinders Innovation
    Chinese trade associations claim that U.S. CHIPS Act and Science law will intensify semiconductor geopolitical competition.  ( 59 min )
    Michigan Man Builds Own ISP, Gets $2.6M From Government to Expand
    Jared Mauch’s rural FTTH service quickly expanded from 1 to 30 customers and currently has 70. But he now has $2.6m of government funding to allow provisioning for nearly 600 customers.  ( 59 min )
    HP Spectre x360 13.5 Review: Do-It-All Device
    The HP Spectre x360 13.5 is a full-featured 2-in-1 with plenty of ports, a sleek design, a colorful display and a sharp webcam. If only HP would stop installing so much software on it.  ( 74 min )
    Arc A750 Trades Blows With RTX 3060 Across Nearly 50 Games
    Intel shares new gaming benchmarks for the Arc A750 graphics card at 1080p and 1440p on various DirectX 12 and Vulkan titles.  ( 62 min )
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    Soccer Story is an adventure RPG about saving football with a "magical soccer ball"
    I grew up in a town where some people hated the colour green, because they supported Rangers FC and green was associated with their rivals, Celtic FC. They would smash green traffic lights, green street cabinets, green shop signs... I wonder what their reaction would be to Soccer Story, an "adventure RPG" about playing football-ish sports in a lush, green, almost Pokémon-like world. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Latest Dwarf Fortress video highlights new art and menus by taking the bins out
    As we've written about before, Dwarf Fortress is getting a Steam release with an official tileset, a new UI, and mouse controls. The latest video from Kitfox Games, who are handling the polished release, features original DF co-creator Zach Adams talking through new menus and artwork... while taking his fort's bins out. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Survival game Nightingale delayed until first half of 2023
    Another game which intended to release in 2022 has posted a JPG to Twitter. This time it's Nightingale, the survival game which was one of our favourite games from not-E3, which has announced a delay until "the first half of 2023." Read more  ( 16 min )
    EA say it's "fair" that players can buy controversial loot boxes in FIFA 23
    FIFA 23's Ultimate Team mode will follow previous games by including loot boxes, EA have confirmed. In the past few years, several studies have linked loot boxes with gambling, and several European countries have moved to regulate them. In a statement given to Eurogamer, EA said that Ultimate Team packs are "a part of FIFA that players love" and that "Giving players the choice to spend if they want to is fair." Read more  ( 16 min )
    Charge up your game controllers with 100 AA batteries for £13
    This is a bit different from what we normally cover, but I was going to order this for myself and thought it might be of interest to you, dear reader, as well. Anyway, you can get ten years' worth of AA batteries - 100 in total! - for just £13 at Amazon right now. This normally costs £18, so that's a nice little savings - and of course it's far cheaper per item than buying batteries in smaller packs. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Our favourite portable SSD is down to £77 at Amazon
    The Crucial X8 is our favourite portable SSD, thanks to its compact protective frame, convenient USB-A or USB-C connection and excellent performance. It's capable of transfer speeds up to 1050MB/s, minimising the time it takes to copy files to and from the drive, and offers low enough access times that you can easily run games from it too. It normally costs around £85, but today it's dropped to a historic low price of £77 - a great value for a portable NVMe SSD offering this level of performance. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Free-to-play brawler Rumbleverse launches with two new modes
    Free-to-play battle royale brawler Rumbleverse is now available on the Epic Games Store. It comes with two additional modes not seen in the pre-launch playtests: the chance to pair up with a pal in Duos and a sort of free roam practice mode called Playground. Read more  ( 16 min )
    No, I still haven't replaced my horrible decaying mousepad
    You knew it would happen. First the wound opened and sprayed you with viscera, then the skin peeled back to raw flesh, and this next step was bound to happen one day. Yet even as the lump shifted beneath your wrist, and you knew it was worming its way free, maybe it wouldn't? Maybe it would be fine? Maybe it would stay there. Please, let it stay there. You can't deal with losing it now. Oh god, let it stay there. Not now. Please, not now. But it happened (of course it did!). And you know what? You're okay. It wasn't the end of the world. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered: PC performance, system requirements and the best settings to use
    Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered is landing on PC, and it’s pretty good! Co-developers Insomniac Games and Nixxes, who spoke to me this week about the port's development, have also taken the care to festoon this version of the open-world crim-puncher with various Windows-exclusive features. These span enhanced ray traced reflections and ultrawide monitor support to both Nvidia DLSS and (surprisingly, given it wasn’t in the initial PC features trailer) AMD FSR 2.0, adding to a list of visual options that already stretches into the sky like a Manhattan high rise. Let’s take a look, then, at how Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered performs on PC – as well as the best settings to keep it swingin’ real smooth like. Read more  ( 25 min )
    Anime MMO Tower Of Fantasy offers players free gifts after rocky launch
    Free-to-play gacha MMO Tower Of Fantasy was struggling with server issues after it lauched yesterday, but - touch wood - no more. The developers say that these are now fixed and that players should find it easier to log in and play. They've also said there's more fixes planned for the next couple of days. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The Electronic Wireless Show episode 197: the most annoying NPCs in video games
    Welcome once again to The Electronic Wireless Show podcast. As a counterpoint to the episode on the nicest blokes to hang out with in games, we've decided to talk about our most hated NPCs (a bonus prize to anyone who can guess which is the one we all say first). It's an interesting one to discuss, because the line between intentionally annoying and unintentionally annoying can be very thin. Plus everyone tends to find different things annoying. Disclaimer: you are not annoying, any similarities you have to characters we find annoying are coincidental. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Axiom Verge 2 is now available on Steam and Steam Deck
    Alien planet exploring Metroidvania Axiom Verge 2 came out a year ago, meaning its time as an Epic Games Store exclusive is up. Protagonist Indra and her drone buddy celebrate their release anniversary by grappling their way over to Steam today. Read more  ( 16 min )
    New Temtem trailer shows off final island coming with 1.0 release in September
    MMO creature battle 'em up Temtem has hatched some details on what to expect when it hits its 1.0 release next month. A new trailer gives details on the island known as "Tamer's Paradise," which hosts a bunch of challenges geared towards end-game players. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Genre-blending dystopia Sunday Gold releases next month, with a free prologue available now
    Turn-based-combat-escape-room-puzzler-RPG blend Sunday Gold will be coming out on September 13th. But if you want to get acquainted with its Cockney cast early, and get some practice with making your best comic book WHAP!s and POW!s, there's also a free prologue available on Steam now. Read more  ( 16 min )
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    Russian invasion has dangerously destabilized cyber security norms
    The inside scoop on the Ukrainian IT army, and what could happen next Black Hat  The hacktivist attacks that have occurred during the ongoing war in Ukraine are setting a dangerous precedent for cyber norms — and infrastructure security, according to journalist and author Kim Zetter.…  ( 6 min )
    AWS and Splunk partner for faster cyberattack response
    OCSF initiative will give enterprise security teams an open standard for moving and analyzing threat data Black Hat  AWS and Splunk are leading an initiative aimed at creating an open standard for ingesting and analyzing data, enabling enterprise security teams to more quickly respond to cyberthreats.…  ( 6 min )
    Google gets the green light to flood US Gmail inboxes with political spam
    Federal Election Commission votes to let Google allow campaign email through filters The US Federal Election Commission on Thursday voted 4-1 to allow Google to create a program exempting qualified political email from Gmail spam filtering, despite emphatic objections from email users.…  ( 5 min )
    Ex-CIA security boss predicts coming crackdown on spyware
    Plus, spoiler alert: ransomware is gonna get a lot worse Black Hat video  It turns out that ex-CIA chief information security officers don't spill secrets at bars in Vegas. Or via Zoom, while pretending to be at a Black Hat cocktail party.…  ( 4 min )
    Sonatype spots another PyPI package behaving badly
    Identity of a real person was used to lend credence to a package that dropped cryptominer in memory Sonatype has unearthed yet more malware lurking on PyPI, this time a fileless Linux nasty designed to mine Monero and using the identity of a real person to lend credibility to the package.…  ( 4 min )
    General Motors charging mandatory $1,500 fee for three years of optional car features
    Don't want the services? You'll still have to pay for them, activated or not Drivers in the US and Canada are in for a bit of sticker shock as General Motors has made three years of its OnStar subscription service mandatory in many new vehicles at a cost of $1,500.…  ( 5 min )
    SmartNICs to make up 38% of network market by 2026
    Dell'Oro sees traditional NICs being displaced for most hyperscale cloud infrastructure SmartNICs are expected to play a significant part in growing the Ethernet adapter market, which is forecast to reach $5 billion by 2026, according to research outfit Dell'Oro.…  ( 4 min )
    Don't be surprised if your organization suffers multiple cyberattacks
    Failing to fix flaws, a crowded threat group scene, RaaS, and dependencies among crooks are fueling the trend Security experts spent years warning enterprises to expect cyberattacks and to plan their defenses accordingly, now Sophos researchers are saying organizations shouldn't be surprised if they get attacked multiple times.…  ( 6 min )
    Dealing with legacy issues around Red Hat crypto versions? Here's a fix
    RHEL SHA-ll speak unto RHEL… except from 9 to 6 If you're running a mixture of new and old RHEL versions, you may have problems SSHing from new to old. Luckily, someone has worked out a handy way around it.…  ( 4 min )
    There can be only one... Microsoft Excel Champion
    Welcome to the world of extreme modeling, techie style. How's your day going? Channel surfers seeking refuge from the world might have stumbled across an esport on ESPN2 that is as brilliant as it is horrifying.…  ( 3 min )
    FCC rejects Starlink's bid for US rural internet access funds
    Even those within the agency puzzled by the SpaceX decision when 'we have the technology to improve lives now' The US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has rejected Starlink's application for subsidies under the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund program.…  ( 5 min )
    Four charged with tricking Qualcomm into buying $150m startup
    Technically the chip giant already owned the tech due to real inventor’s contract, according to DoJ The US Department of Justice has charged four people with conspiring to fraudulently sell a startup for $150 million to a San Diego based multinational tech company that The Reg has identified as Qualcomm.…  ( 5 min )
    Want the very latest Windows Insider Dev Channel build? Check your disk space
    You might need to free up 24GB. A bug for now, but might be sign of way things are going Remember when you could run Windows from a floppy disk? The latest Windows 11 Dev Channel Insider build could need at least 24GB of free space to download and install.…  ( 4 min )
    Ex-Twitter staffer convicted of spying for Saudi Arabia
    Ahmad Abouammo is facing 10-20 years in prison for leaking PII from 6,000 Twitter accounts A former Twitter employee faces up to 20 years in prison after being convicted of spying for Saudi Arabia and its royal family.…  ( 4 min )
    BT wins networking contract for UK nuclear site Sellafield
    Paving the way for the role of AI in the future of nuclear waste processing UK telephony outfit British Telecom has won a five-year deal for networking at the Sellafield nuclear site in northwest England.…  ( 4 min )
    Supermicro pulls in a strong quarter thanks to rack-scale demand
    More customers also adopting the server maker's green computing products, CEO says Supermicro, server provider to the hyperscale cloud providers, has delivered better than expected figures for its fiscal Q4 2022, attributing it to a growing number of customers adopting its rack-scale solutions.…  ( 4 min )
    Rescuezilla 2.4 is here: Grab it before you need it
    A fork of Redo Rescue that outdoes the original – and beats Clonezilla too Version 2.4 of Rescuezilla - which describes itself as the "Swiss Army Knife of System Recovery," - is here and based on Ubuntu 22.04.…  ( 5 min )
    DoE digs up molten salt nuclear reactor tech, taps Los Alamos to lead the way back
    The collaborative effort pits supercomputers against the agency's corrosive reactor research After more than 50 years, molten salt nuclear reactors might be making a comeback. The US Department of Energy (DoE) has tapped Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) to lead a $9.25 million study into the structural properties and materials necessary to build them at scale.…  ( 4 min )
    Intel, Amazon, and SpaceX asked to tuck into DARPA's Space-BACN
    Internetwork of satellite networks advances to 'actually building' stuff stage DARPA's attempt to build an internetwork of communications satellites – which operates under the fabulous name Space-BACN – has tapped Intel, SpaceX and others to build kit that will make its planned "Space-Based Adaptive Communications Node" a reality.…  ( 4 min )
    Cisco admits corporate network compromised by gang with links to Lapsus$
    Voice-phished their way in, but Switchzilla claims no damage done Cisco disclosed on Wednesday that its corporate network was accessed by cyber-criminals in May after an employee's personal Google account was compromised – an act a ransomware gang named "Yanluowang" has now claimed as its work.…  ( 5 min )
    SoftBank offloads part of Alibaba stake to raise much-needed cash
    Invested $20 million in 2000 and will pocket $34 billion and keep a slice worth more than that – for now Japan's SoftBank Group will offload almost half its holdings in Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, netting over $20 billion to help it record a profit but casting doubts over Alibaba's prospects.…  ( 4 min )
    Economic uncertainty can't stop cloud growth
    You may have had your fill of chips – but AWS, GCP, and Azure are still hungry, analyst tells El Reg The hyperscalers and public cloud providers are barreling ahead, unfazed by a rapidly deteriorating economic outlook, according to a recent Dell'Oro Group report.…  ( 5 min )
    Microsoft joins India's monopoly-busting e-commerce multi-mart
    The Open Network for Digital Commerce could hardly ask for a more credible participant Microsoft has decided to open a store in India's Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) – an effort the nation hopes will make it harder for the likes of Amazon and Walmart-controlled Flipkart to dominate e-commerce in the world's second most populous nation.…  ( 4 min )
    Meta privacy red team lead: Does your business know its privacy adversaries?
    Ethical hackers, but for privacy programs Black Hat  Miscreants aren't only working to exploit flaws in an enterprise's security posture, they're also looking for holes in organizations' privacy programs to steal user data, according to Meta's Scott Tenaglia.…  ( 4 min )
    Boffins rate npm and PyPI package security and it's not good
    Guess what? Open source security still has gaps The Open Source Security Foundation (OpenSSF), as its name plainly states, aims to help make open source software more secure, but improvements flowing from its efforts are hard to find.…  ( 7 min )
    Tech industry stuck over patent problems with AI algorithms
    Lawyers at Google are unsure if they can patent chip floorplans created by machines The question of whether AI-generated outputs can be patented is impacting how technology companies can protect their intellectual property.…  ( 4 min )
    Ex-CISA chief Krebs calls for US to get serious on security
    Black Hat kicks off with call for single infosec agency with real clout and less confused crossover Black Hat  It's time to reorganize the US government and create a new agency focused solely on on digital risk management services, according to former CISA director Chris Krebs.…  ( 6 min )
    Google tells Apple to 'fix text messaging' in bid to promote RCS protocol
    iMessage talks to Android users via outdated SMS/MMS, ad giant complains Google has launched a campaign to pressure Apple to adopt Rich Communications Services (RCS), a protocol used by most mobile industry vendors but not the iPhone maker.…  ( 5 min )
  • Open

    Play football and save the world in Not Tonight dev's adventure RPG Soccer Story
    If plain old football doesn't quite do it for you, but your interest is piqued when I say football but melded to a silly, sprawling action-RPG, then allow me to introduce you to Soccer Story from publisher No More Robots and Not Tonight developer PanicBarn, coming to Steam, Switch, PlayStation, Xbox, and Game Pass "soon". Soccer Story (which, despite the name and similar premise, is unrelated to developer Sidebar Games' magnificent Golf Story) is a single-player "physics-based" adventure in which players must quest, puzzle, and sport their way to restoring football - and, thus, peace and harmony - in a world where it's been banned. Soccer Story promises an adventure packed with "quirky characters, quests, rogue refs, and wack soccer-adjacent sports", where every problem - from solving puzzles to finding secrets - can be overcome with the help of your magic football. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Metal Slug Tactics delayed into next year
    Metal Slug Tactics, developer Leikir Studio's turn-based tactical twist on SNK's classic run-and-gun series, has been delayed and is now due to release on PC and Switch sometime next year. Announced last June, Metal Slug Tactics reunites familiar faces Marco, Eri, Fio, and Tarma as they lead the Peregrine Falcon Squad onto a different kind of battlefield, where the series' classic side-scrolling action makes way for "dynamic, strategic combat" on a grid-based map. Skill trees, perks, and a "super attack-fueling" adrenaline system have all been been promised upon Metal Slug Tactics' arrival, which was originally expected to occur at some point this year. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Ex-BioWare boss' Victorian fantasy adventure Nightingale delayed into next year
    Inflexion Games, the studio founded by former BioWare boss Aaryn Flynn, has announced a delay for its Victorian fantasy adventure Nightingale, with the game now expected to enter early access some time next year. Nightingale, described as a "shared world survival crafting game", was initially announced a few years back, but got its first proper unveiling at last year's The Game Awards. Its reveal was accompanied by an eye-catching trailer in which well-dressed ladies and gents travelled through portals to strange new worlds, full of wonderfully unsettling eldritch creatures. Inflexion was initially aiming to launch Nightingale into early access at some point this year, but the developer has now revised that plan, pushing the game's early access release back into the "first half of 2023". Read more  ( 15 min )
    Are Sony and Microsoft's squabbles over Call of Duty just business as usual?
    This week on the Eurogamer Newscast, we discuss the ongoing fallout from Microsoft and Sony's squabbling over Activision Blizzard and it's blockbuster franchise Call of Duty. If you've been living under a rock for the last six months, this all stems from Microsoft's intent to buy Activision for 68.7bn, which Sony isn't too happy about. Recently we've heard arguments from Sony offering some of its views on the deal - that it would be bad news for PlayStation, essentially - and now Microsoft itself has hit back. Microsoft has reiterated that it does not want to make Call of Duty an Xbox exclusive - for now, at least - and even said it would be an unprofitable move if it did so. Even more remarkably, it has also hit out at Sony for suggesting the Microsoft-Activision deal would stifle competition - and claimed PlayStation itself pays out money to block games coming to Xbox Game Pass. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Splatoon 3 idols Deep Cut are the internet's new faves
    Yesterday's Nintendo Direct featured all things Splatoon 3, and had plenty for returning players and newcomers to get excited about. People are especially hyped for Deep Cut, the new idol group that'll act as hosts throughout the game. Comprised of members Shiver, Frye and Big Man, Nintendo showed off one of Deep Cut's performances for Splatfest celebrations. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Fortnite begins teasing big Dragon Ball crossover
    The world of Dragon Ball is coming to Fortnite, because of course it is. Fans poking around in Fortnite's game files have known this crossover was coming for some time. Today, Epic Games - fresh from its two-week summer break - began teasing the collaboration. Fortnite's Dragon Ball event is expected to be a big one, with numerous characters coming to the game as skins, alongside weeks of tie-in challenges. Read more  ( 15 min )
    EA sticks with controversial loot boxes for FIFA 23 Ultimate Team
    EA has confirmed it's sticking with loot boxes for FIFA 23's Ultimate Team mode, after the company was effectively given the green light by the UK government's recent decision not to legislate the controversial in-game monetisation system. In a statement issued to Eurogamer, EA echoed many of its recent comments on Ultimate Team's card packs, which have come under fire from children's groups and researchers in recent years for their links to gambling, and from players for enabling pay-to-win in competitive modes. "We wholeheartedly believe that Ultimate Team and FUT Packs, which have been part of the game for more than a decade, are a part of FIFA that players love - fans love that the game reflects the real-world excitement and strategy of building and managing a squad. Giving players the choice to spend if they want to is fair," EA's statement reads. Read more  ( 17 min )
    Apex Legends' new season hits all-time Steam peak player count
    Following the launch of Season 14, which is known as Hunted, Apex Legends has seen a new peak player count on Steam. In fact, over 500,000 concurrent players joined in with Respawn's battle-royale, following the season's release on Tuesday. This is a first for the shooter, Twitter account AlphaINTEL noted. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Street Fighter 6 soundtrack heavily influenced by hip-hop culture
    Players can expect plenty of hip-hop in the Street Fighter 6 soundtrack as the game modernises the series, while honouring the past. In an interview with Spin, producer Shuhei Matsumoto and lead composer Yoshiya Terayama discussed the musical influences on the next game. "Street Fighter 6 is very respectful of past works, such as the original Street Fighter and Street Fighter 2. We are taking on new challenges while honouring that foundation. Also, you can definitely expect hip hop. We put a lot of effort into how it sounds," said Matsumoto. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Nintendo hit by new worker complaint in US
    Nintendo has been hit by a fresh worker complaint in the US, which a report suggests is due to the company's response to labour activism. Both Nintendo of America and Aston Carter, a company Nintendo uses to recruit workers, have been referred to the National Labor Relations Board over the matter, which alleges that a worker suffered over the company's "coercive rules". The complaint was first reported by Axios, which stated that allegations of this nature typically relate to cases where a worker claims a company has interfered with their right to unionise or discuss working conditions. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Trans Twitch streamer arrested by police and "terrorised" after swatting incident
    Twitch streamer Clara "Keffals" Sorrenti was "terrorised" by police when arrested after a swatting incident. The trans Canadian streamer recounted the event in a YouTube video titled "My life is in danger. I need your help", where she described being woken up by police officers pointing an assault rifle in her face at her home. She was subsequently taken into police custody where she was accused of crimes she did not commit. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Forspoken trailer getting rough response online
    So let me get this straight. I'm somewhere that's not what I would call the Eurogamer office. I'm seeing my name printed on the site. And... oh yeah I'm writing meme round-ups for Eurogamer. Yeah okay that is something I do now. I'm sorry, I couldn't resist. The latest Forspoken trailer was really asking for it though. Forspoken last made the headlines when its release date was pushed back from 11th October this year to 24th January 2023. It's back again, though this time for a more light-hearted reason. Read more  ( 17 min )
    The story of Games Workshop and Fighting Fantasy
    Imagine getting a phone call from a guy called Gary Gygax in America and he's reading a newsletter you wrote for a games business you're running out of a messy flat in London, and he likes it so much he wants to send you a copy of a new game he's working on called Dungeons & Dragons. You end up loving the game and he likes what you're about, so he grants you exclusive rights to introduce Dungeons & Dragons to the UK, and to Europe, and to sell it there for three years. You can only afford six copies but it doesn't matter: you'll soon be able to afford a lot more. That's not even the best story my guests have! They've done so much and created so much. That games business they were running? It was only Games Workshop, wasn't it - a business that would change the face of tabletop gaming. But, not content with running only that, this pair would work well into their nights to create a series of game books called Fighting Fantasy, making themselves best-selling authors in the process. The series has sold more than 20 million copies today. Read more  ( 14 min )
    Sony launches PlayStation games for PC page
    A new page has appeared on PlayStation's website dedicated to its games for PC. This page, which you can see here, does exactly what is says on the tin. Here you will find information on all of PlayStation's games that have been introduced to PC, such as Days Gone, God of War and Horizon Zero Dawn - but also details on upcoming releases. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Kirby's Dream Buffet launches next week via Nintendo Switch eShop
    Kirby's Dream Buffet launches next week, on Wednesday 17th August, priced at £13.49. As a reminder, this is the all-new downloadable Kirby game set for the Nintendo Switch eShop, which got announced just a month ago. A spin-off from the pink puffball's regular platforming antics, Dream Buffet sees up to four players roll around levels as different-coloured Kirby characters, gobbling up types of food and sweet treats. Whoever eats the most, wins! Read more  ( 15 min )
    Call of Duty Xbox exclusivity "wouldn't be profitable", Microsoft says
    Making Call of Duty exclusive to Xbox "simply wouldn't be profitable", Microsoft has said. The claim comes as part of a fresh war of words between Xbox and PlayStation, as Microsoft seeks to finalise its eye-opening $68.7bn buyout of Activision Blizzard. Specifically, it comes in response to Sony's recent objections to the deal - in which it argued that Call of Duty could not be rivalled, and that the franchise was vitally important to PlayStation as it influenced players' choice of console. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Splatoon 3's demo brings free Nintendo Switch Online trial with it
    Along with the upcoming demo for Splatoon 3, Nintendo is also offering Switch users a pretty awesome little perk. To get access to the demo, you will need to have a Nintendo Switch Online subscription. However, not everyone who has a Switch necessarily wants to subscribe to NSO. To negate this, Nintendo is offering everyone who downloads the demo a code that will give them a seven day trial of its subscription service. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Report finds fewer Chinese youth play games following government restrictions
    Following the introduction of government-mandated gaming restrictions, 54 percent of Chinese youth are reportedly playing games within regulated hours. That's according to a new 2022 China Youth Gamers report from Niko Partners (thanks GamesIndustry.biz). The study found that 77 percent of youth are at least playing fewer hours per week, even though only 54 percent are within approved hours. Read more  ( 14 min )
    PowerWash Simulator's speedrunning scene puts both time and water under extreme pressure
    When PowerWash Simulator came out of Early Access, it became quite a hit amongst the team here at Eurogamer. I was curious to see whether I'd enjoy it too, so I cashed in the free month of Game Pass that came with my new PC to give it a try. I enjoy it a lot. In the game's career mode, there is no pressure to finish a level quickly or efficiently and that's what I love about it. You can ignore the time and leave the hose running for as long as it takes you, and that's all part of the appeal. Bertie expertly summed it up in his review.: "This is not a game about rushing towards an end," he wrote. "This is a game about the sedate pleasures of repetitive work - a slower game about the satisfaction of a job well done. It's relaxing and calming, and that's a powerful quality." But this inevitably got me wondering about the other end of the gameplay spectrum in PowerWash Simulator. Speed and efficiency, rather than leisure. True, you can already play the game's time-limited and water-limited modes, but they weren't as extreme as what I was imagining. I'm talking speedwashing. Was there anyone out there playing like that? Read more  ( 18 min )
    HBO's The Last of Us casts brothers Henry and Sam
    The actors playing brothers Henry and Sam in HBO's adaptation of The Last of Us have been announced. IGN has revealed that Henry will be played by Lamar Johnson, while his younger brother Sam will be played by Keivonn Woodard. Johnson's previous credits include Canadian police drama Rookie Blue and Your Honor with Bryan Cranston. Woodard has no previous acting credits. Along with this news, some upcoming plot elements were also revealed. If you are keen to avoid spoilers, please stop reading here. Read more
    Pokémon Center London timeslot reservations now live
    Reservations to visit London's Pokémon Center pop-up store are now open. The store will be running alongside the Pokémon World Championships, which is being held at ExCeL London from 17th to 21st August. Anyone wishing to visit the store can now reserve themselves a timeslot via the appointment manager. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Midgar feels R.E.A.L. thanks to this new VR mod for Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade
    Flat screen to VR mods are easily the most exciting thing happening in the virtual reality gaming sphere right now and, thanks to a host of talented modders, they just keep on coming! On this week's VR Corner, you can watch me try out Luke Ross' new R.E.A.L. VR mod for Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade and it's an absolute treat for the eyes! Honestly, if you though this game looked beautiful in 2D, just you wait until you see it in glorious 6DoF VR. It'll take your breath away! In the video below, I make my way from the very start of the game, all the way through to the Shinra Reactor boss fight, the ruins of Sector 1, and finally to a meeting with Tifa in the Seventh Heaven bar. Read more  ( 16 min )
    id Software consolidating Steam games to lessen confusion
    id Software is consolidating its games on Steam to improve the shopping experience. The news comes from a blog post on Steam that details how its library of games is being simplified under specific titles from 10th August. "Spanning across multiple decades, id Software's library of work is as vast as it is full of amazing games," reads the post. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Apex Legends - something's got to give
    My fireteam and I - hitherto committed to PUBG but casually on the lookout for something else, so unhappy were we with the lack of communication, infrequent updates, and all-too-common disconnects - had been on the hunt for a new team-based shooter, and Apex Legends scratched an itch that neither Fortnite nor PUBG could reach. Fun, chaotic, and built on fantastically snappy gunplay, Respawn's surprise battle royale hit the floor running, and we fell for it faster than Bangalore drop, shock and locks. Apex Legends' arrival was smooth, too, immediately feeling polished, and it offered a frantic, pacey twist on the battle royale formula. It became our go-to game, not for a few weeks or months, but for years. The wheels started to fall off for us when Apex Legends introduced skill-based ma…  ( 19 min )
  • Open

    Sauropods had soft foot pads to help support their massive weight
    Australian scientists find first biomechanical evidence for a long-suspected idea.  ( 5 min )
    Sonos delays its hotly anticipated Sub Mini after a rough financial quarter
    The Sub Mini was expected any day, but it's been pushed back.  ( 5 min )
    Disney-owned streaming trifecta unveils price hikes, ad-supported Disney+
    That's one way to say you're not necessarily raising prices, Disney+.  ( 6 min )
    Musk wants Twitter to identify employees who calculate spam percentage
    Musk tells judge Twitter isn't producing names of employees he wants to question.  ( 5 min )
    Lawsuits: OnlyFans bribed Instagram to put creators on “terrorist blacklist”
    Thousands of adult entertainers claim they were added to a "blacklist."  ( 7 min )
    Intel tests show its Arc A750 GPU beating an RTX 3060, if only you could buy one
    A750 will be less competitive in older games, but it will all come down to price.  ( 6 min )
    FTC aims to counter the “massive scale” of online data collection
    Rulemaking action already has support, but some want Congress to act first.  ( 6 min )
    Amid backlash from privacy advocates, Meta expands end-to-end encryption trial
    E2EE prevents anyone other than the sender and receiver from reading messages.  ( 5 min )
    2022 Moto Razr gets big price drop, 144 Hz display, flagship SoC
    The new Razr looks a lot like the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip.  ( 6 min )
    Did giant impacts start plate tectonics?
    Plate tectonics may have its origins in impacts, based on new data from Australia.  ( 6 min )
    Meta’s flailing Portal repurposed as a wireless portable monitor
    Ahead of a rumored shift to businesses, the video-calling device broadens its appeal.  ( 5 min )
    One of 5G’s biggest features is a security minefield
    There are vulnerabilities in 5G platforms carriers offer to wrangle embedded device data.  ( 6 min )
    Backyard hens’ eggs contain 40 times more lead on average than shop eggs
    Research has implications for urban gardening and food production.  ( 5 min )
    New tragic details of US child who died from tropical bacteria in room spray
    The healthy boy died a week after falling ill with the tricky-to-diagnose infection.  ( 7 min )
  • Open

    Ta ett djupt andetag! Subnautica-studion visar sitt nya spel på Gamescom
    Lutar åt ett strategiskt Subnautica – eller?  ( 6 min )
    Buffé! Det nya Kirby-spelet släpps nästa vecka
    Kirby's Dream Buffet är Switch-exklusivt.  ( 6 min )
    Antydan om att Playstations pc-spel kan komma att kräva PSN-konto
    Sony öppnar ny sajt för pc-satsningen.  ( 6 min )
    Microsoft: Inte lönsamt att göra Call of Duty Xbox-exklusivt
    Tonar ner oron för att Playstation-spelare blir utan CoD.  ( 7 min )
    Antalet Roblox-spelare ökar kraftigt, men fortsätter göra förlust
    Störst är ingen garanti för vinst.  ( 6 min )
    Id Software gör det enklare att köpa Quake, Doom och andra gamlingar på Steam
    Storstädar sitt Steam-bibliotek.  ( 6 min )
    Internet hånar lökig Forspoken-trailer
    "I'm seeing freaking dragons."  ( 6 min )
    Quiz – Vad kan du om änglar och demoner?
    Himmel och helvete. Veckans quiz handlar om både det saliga och det syndiga.  ( 6 min )
    Microsoft: Sony betalar utvecklare för att skippa Game Pass
    Xbox-ägaren avfyrar hård kritik mot värsta konkurrenten.  ( 7 min )
    Square Enix kovänder: The DioField Chronicle har fått en pc-demo
    Och konsolerna har också tillgång till den, som lovat.  ( 6 min )
    Saints Row peppar oss med en videogenomgång inför släppet
    Bekanta er med gängen, karaktärerna och "affärsmöjligheterna" i Santo Ileso.  ( 6 min )
    Fyra nya skådespelare i The Last of Us-serien avslöjade
    Två karaktärer från spelet och två som är unika för serien.  ( 6 min )
    Playstation Plus-katalogen utökas med Yakuza, Trials of Mana och andra titlar
    Men bara för Extra- och Premium-medlemmar.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    Asahi Linux May Pursue Writing Apple Silicon GPU Driver In Rust
    When it comes to the Apple M1 and M2 support on Linux, one of the biggest obstacles to suitable daily use for end-users is the current lack of GPU acceleration. Reverse engineering has been happening for the Apple Silicon graphics processor, early experiments being carried out under macOS and Asahi's m1n1 environment, and the next step will be to start writing a Direct Rendering Manager (DRM) kernel driver. To some surprise, the feasibility of writing this DRM kernel GPU driver in the Rust programming language is being explored...  ( 5 min )
    Linux 5.19.1 Released With LTS Kernels Back To 4.19 For The "PBRSB" CPU Issue
    A number of new Linux kernel stable releases are out this week with new mitigations around the latest batch of published CPU security vulnerabilities. Linux 5.19.1, 5.18.17, 5.15.60, 5.10.136, 5.4.210, and 4.19.255 are the new releases out today...  ( 5 min )
    AMD Posts Linux Patches For "LbrExtV2" Zen 4 CPU Feature
    While all of the key Zen 4 CPU functionality appears in place for the mainline Linux kernel, AMD engineers continue working to enable other new Zen 4 features for use under Linux. The newest patches out of AMD this morning are for LbrExtV2...  ( 5 min )
    Ubuntu 22.04.1 LTS Released
    Following a one week delay due to a last minute blocker bug being discovered, Canonical today has shipped Ubuntu 22.04.1 LTS as the first point release to this current long-term support series...  ( 4 min )
    Loongson Adds LoongArch Support To LibreOffice
    Following GCC 12 introducing LoongArch support earlier this year, Linux 5.19 adding the initial LoongArch port, and Glibc 2.36 adding LoongArch, LibreOffice is now the latest high-profile open-source project adding support for this Chinese processor ISA that started out derived from MIPS64...  ( 5 min )
    GNOME Mutter & Shell 43 Beta Bring Several Very Exciting Changes
    GNOME's Shell and Mutter components have released their beta versions for this GNOME 43 milestone. Particularly on the Mutter side are some very exciting changes from improvements to direct scan-out, high resolution scroll wheel support being completed and merged, various Wayland improvements, and more performance optimizations...  ( 5 min )
    Linux 6.0 Fixes Touchpad & Keyboard Issues After Suspend For Many TUXEDO Laptops
    A number of TUXEDO Computers' Linux laptops and Clevo laptops that have had keyboard and/or touchpad issues after system suspend cycles should be properly working now with Linux 6.0...  ( 5 min )
    X.Org Protocols 2022.2 Released With XWAYLAND Extension, DRI3 v1.3
    Xorgproto 2022.2 has been released as the newest version of this collection of X.Org/X11 protocols. Most notable with this rare xorgproto update is the introduction of a new extension, XWAYLAND...  ( 5 min )
    Mesa 22.2-rc2 Released With Many Fixes - Heavy On Zink
    Following last week's branching and feature freeze along with the Mesa 22.2-rc1 release, released on Wednesday evening was Mesa 22.2-rc2 as the first week's worth of bug fixing...  ( 4 min )
  • Open

    Quiz: Elektrifierande quiz om nätaggregat – spänning utlovas
    "Watt kan du ohm nätaggregat?" var det effektfulla namnet på vårat förra quiz på samma ämne. Den här veckan är vi laddade och presenterar uppföljaren.  ( 5 min )
    Intels Arc A750 besegrar Geforce RTX 3060 i 50 testade spel
    I väntan på lanseringen av Arc A750 presenterar Intel prestandasiffror från en hel hög spel, som pekar på att kortet i bästa fall slår Nvidias populära mellanklassmodell.  ( 7 min )
    Intel besegrar Geforce RTX 3060 i 50 testade spel
    I väntan på lanseringen av Arc A750 presenterar Intel prestandasiffror från en hel hög spel, som pekar på att kortet i bästa fall slår Nvidias populära mellanklassmodell.  ( 7 min )
    Ett välsvarvat ekosystem finpoleras med Samsungs uppdaterade Galaxy-produkter
    Vid sidan av Galaxy Z Flip4 och Galaxy Z Fold4 släpper Samsung Galaxy Buds2 Pro samt klockduon Galaxy Watch5 och Watch5 Pro. Vi sammanfattar nyheterna.  ( 9 min )
    CHIPS and Science Act ska locka kretstillverkning till USA
    Med 76 miljarder USD i investering från USA ska den nya akten övertyga företag att producera halvledare i landet.  ( 6 min )
    Nothing Phone 1 en pina att reparera
    Bakom den exponerande glasbaksidan finns en fasad av plast, LED och dolda skruvar, som gör Phone 1 till en mycket svårarbetad telefon.  ( 6 min )
    Nästa Grand Theft Auto ska sätta ny standard för spelbranschen
    Många väntar med spänning på vad Rockstar kokar ihop som efterträdare till seglivade GTA V. Företaget förklarar att ambitionsnivån är skyhög.  ( 6 min )
  • Open

    NBA 2K23 The Jordan Challenge returns - here's what to expect.
    The Jordan Challenge is coming with NBA 2K23, making its long awaited return after 12 years away from the franchise. In this mode you’ll be able to take on 15 unique experiences, each set in one of Michael Jordan’s milestone moments in their career. Alongside each of the challenges, you’ll be able to watch a video interview with a luminary integral to each real life moment, including – but not limited to – 1998 opponent Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Denis Rodman, and head coach Phil Jackson. One of the coolest aspects of the Jordan Challenge is the attention to year-specific detail. The games have filters that reflect the recording / T.V quality of the time, and you can see era-specific jerseys, courts, and even sponsors during each mission. As such, it’s about as close to an authentic retelling of Michael Jordan’s career as you could hope for. Read more  ( 16 min )
    THQ Nordic 2022 Digital Showcase time and date, and how to watch
    Just when you thought it was safe to take yourself away from your monitor, the games industry throws out one more showcase for you to drool over. Not content with Summer Games Fest and all those E3 stand-ins, THQ Nordic is setting up its own showcase that'll feature at least 14 games. Dubbed THQ Nordic's digital showcase 2022, the show promises to give us updates on a slew of announced and unannounced titles from the publisher. All the information you need to watch this late-summer showcase can be found below. Maybe once this one is wrapped up, we'll be safe. Until PAX East. And Gamescom. And the Game Awards. Read more  ( 15 min )
    HBO's The Last of Us will star Lamar Johnson and Keivonn Woodard
    It's been a short while since we've heard anything new about HBO's TV take on Naughty Dog's The Last of Us. Now, in an exclusive report with IGN, the cast for the show has been revealed, and a little more about the narrative has been shared. That said, please be aware that there may be some minor spoilers to follow for HBO's The Last of Us. It has been revealed that Lamar Johnson will be taking on the role of Henry, with Keivonn Woodard playing his brother, Sam. The brothers are described in the press release as being in Kansas City, hiding from a revolutionary movement seeking vengeance. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Call of Duty Black Ops 4's scrapped campaign has leaked online
    Years after its release, leaked details and assets for the scrapped campaign in Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 have appeared online. Posted on Reddit by user PurpleToaster20, over 400 images of documentation, early builds, and storyboards are available to view. This fairly comprehensive overview of what got scrapped is open for anyone and everyone to read. In addition, a full on video will be posted August 18 going through these assets and the info, set to run for roughly 30 minutes. According to the leaker, this vast collection of information was gathered from a variety of sources. To break down some of the juicy details put out in the open, we know from these leaks that the scrapped 2017 campaign mode was intended to be a 2v2 affair. Titled 'career', you and a partner would race to the finish of a 15-20 minute mission, taking on AI enemies that block your path along the way. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Lego is a video game force to be reckoned with – but I miss its early, experimental gaming age
    This week, Lego turns 90 years old – an incredible milestone for a little toy company that, at several points in its life, was on the verge of going under. It’s more impressive still that Lego reaches this milestone while one of the biggest toy brands on the planet, recognizable to children everywhere, and all achieved while remaining a private company. Lego has always had an interesting relationship with video games. On one hand, the company naturally sees video games as competition: when Lego’s financial results declined for the first time in 13 years (half a decade ago), one market factor the company pointed the finger at was kids playing more video games. At the same time, however, gaming has become an inexctricable part of Lego’s business. We now get a high-quality Lego-based video game at least every couple of years – and quite often more frequently than that. These are usually based on Lego’s licensed properties – so gaming adventures that retell the stories of comic book, or Star Wars, or Harry Potter and its kin – just with the tale spun in a blocky, comedic form. A lot is owed to the Lego games as designed by British developer Traveler’s Tales, in fact: much of the presentation of the hugely successful Lego movies has its genesis in these gaming experiences. Read more  ( 18 min )
    PS Plus August Extra and Premium lineup revealed, and it’s packed with Yakuza
    The next batch of games being added to PlayStation Plus Extra and Premium has been revealed by Sony. For owners of PS Plus Extra, you'll be able to pick up three different Yakuza titles, which is just the beginning for Yakuza fans or those keen to try out the series for the first time. Ultimately, the full Yakuza series is going to be coming to PS Plus before the end of 2022. So, if you've never tried the games out, now's the time to start. Read more  ( 16 min )
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    How to Find Your MAC address in Ubuntu and Other Linux Distros
    A quick tutorial about finding the MAC address of various networking interfaces including Bluetooth in Linux. Both command line and GUI methods have been discussed.  ( 24 min )

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    Microsoft claims Sony pays developers "blocking rights" to keep games off Xbox Game Pass
    In a lengthy document submitted to the Brazilian government as part of its investigation into Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard, Microsoft has claimed Sony pays developers "blocking rights" to prevent games from appearing on Xbox Game Pass. The accusation appears in a 27-page rebuttal of Sony's recent objections to Microsoft's Activision Blizzard buyout, made to Brazil's Administrative Council for Economic Defense (CADE) as part of its investigation. Much of Sony's argument had focused on Call of Duty - which it claimed had "no rival" and was "so popular that it influences users' choice of console" - with the PlayStation maker suggesting, among other things, that the inclusion of Call of Duty on Microsoft's Game Pass service would hamper its ability to compete. Microsoft's response is as wide-ranging as Sony's initial objections, touching on everything from the fact it has previously managed to grow Game Pass without Activision Blizzard's titles - suggesting Call of Duty mightn't be quite as "essential" as Sony claims - to a reiteration of its assurances that it won't be making Call of Duty an Xbox console exclusive. Read more  ( 15 min )
    Norwood Suite dev's surreal dice-chucker Betrayal At Club Low out in September
    Betrayal At Club Low - the latest jazz-infused odyssey from The Norwood Suite developer Cosmo D - finally has a release date, and will be swinging open its murderous doors for some woozily surreal adventure on 9th September. Folding into the broader narrative of Cosmo D's interconnected Off-Peak City games (so far consisting of 2015's Off-Peak, 2017's The Norwood Suite, and its 2020 follow-up Tales from Off-Peak City Vol. 1), Betrayal At Club Low sees players going undercover to attempt a rescue mission of sorts by infiltrating a "deceptively dangerous" nightclub/former coffin factory/"haven for wild-limbed dancing, mind-altering music and shady characters". While previous games in the series were largely focussed on relaxed roaming and light puzzling as players soaked up their deliciously off-kilter sensibilities, Betrayal at Club Low does things a little differently, drawing inspiration from "short, punchy, independent zine RPGs" in order to evoke the feel of a one-off tabletop session. Read more  ( 15 min )
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    Firm Estimates Intel's GPU Unit Losses at $3.5 Billion, Suggests Sell Off
    Jon Peddie Research estimates Intel's GPU endeavors have resulting in $3.5 billion in losses and suggests Intel might want to sell it off after multiple failures.  ( 62 min )
    Best Gaming Keyboards for 2022: Mechanical, TKL, and More
    These are the best gaming keyboards that combine responsiveness, features, and style.  ( 82 min )
    Spider-Man Remastered Tested: How Does it Run on Your GPU?
    We've tested the Spider-Man Remastered PC port on a group of AMD and Nvidia GPUs to see how it runs, and have also provided an in-depth analysis of the best settings for smooth frame rates.  ( 74 min )
    Gigabyte X670 Motherboards Feature Screwless and Latchless M.2, PCIe Slots
    Gigabyte has revealed some new quality-of-life updates for its motherboards, featuring a latchless PCIe slot and a screwless M.2 slot.  ( 59 min )
    AMD Continues PC and Server Market Share Gains Amid Slumping Market
    AMD makes big gains in desktop, mobile and server CPU markets.  ( 64 min )
    MSI Introduces World's First ATX 3.0 PSU, Ready for 2,600W Power Spikes
    MSI releases the world's first PSU, that is compatible with Intel's new ATX 3.0 power supply standard. The new standard focuses on improving power-delivery and reliability, and features 600W power connectors for video cards.  ( 59 min )
    Consumer DRAM Prices Set to Drop 18% in Q3 — TrendForce
    TrendForce expects consumer DRAM prices to drop 13% – 18% in Q3, then collapse further in Q4.  ( 60 min )
    Solidigm Introduces Industry-First PLC NAND for Higher Storage Densities
    SK hynix-owned Solidigm took to the Flash memory Summit 2022 to showcase its working prototype SSD based on Penta Level Cell (PLC) NAND, which promises to bring density increases to a market thirsty for storage.  ( 60 min )
    LattePanda Reveals 3 Delta SBC With Intel and Arduino
    Chinese manufacturer LattePanda has taken the covers off its latest SBC, the 3 Delta.  ( 59 min )
    GPU Shipments May Drop by 50%, Nvidia Braces for Long Winter
    Intel and Nvidia prepare for big revenue drops as consumer demand falls; AMD and Apple are doing fine.  ( 59 min )
    Intel's Flagship Core i9-12900KF Now Only $499: Real Deals
    You can currently get your hands on Intel's flagship processor, the Core i9-12900KF, for only $499 on eBay saving almost $50 off its usual price.  ( 66 min )
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    The cheapest ultra-wide on Amazon is this 25-in 2560x1080 model for £110
    How much gaming monitor can you get for £100? Not much, it turns out - but I did spot something unexpected for £10 more: a genuine ultra-wide monitor. Now, it's not a stunner as far as looks go, and it's not got the latest specs either. But what it has got is an expansive 25-inch span, a 2560x1080 resolution and a blistering refresh rate of... 75Hz. OK, so it's far from the best gaming monitor on the planet, but getting an IPS monitor of this size is honestly not bad going - especially as it's been reduced from a UK RRP of £170. Read more  ( 16 min )
    Pick up this 1TB NVMe SSD for £58.84
    Intel's SSD 670p Series is one of the cheapest ways to add high-speed NVMe storage to your system, and now a 1TB drive has been reduced to just £59 in the UK. That's a big price drop on a drive that normally sells for £90, and is nearly as cheap as the £54 that this drive cost during the last Amazon Prime Day. Read more  ( 16 min )
    The DioField Chronicle does have a PC demo after all, and you can play it right now
    I was a bit sad when Square Enix announced last month that PC players would be missing out on the first demo for their upcoming strategy game The DioField Chronicle, but happily the RPG giant has reconsidered their tactical options and released it on Steam after all. The move coincides with pre-orders also going live, but the good news is that your save data, progress and character levels from the demo will all transfer over to the final game should you decide to take the plunge in full when the game comes out on September 22nd. Huzzah. Read more  ( 17 min )
    What's better: nude mods, or going into guts and meat?
    Last time, you decided that cameras which actually take pictures are better than running into a wall so fast you hurt yourself. Immersive sims shudder in revulsion from this outcome (but sadly don't take damage from their vibration). Cameras won by only eight votes, so you'd better join in if you feel strongly about this week's face-off. And this one might involve taking a face... off. What's better: nude mods, or going into guts and meat? Read more  ( 17 min )
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    PlayStation Plus’ highest tier slams to an apparent halt on classic games
    After service's June revision, we review how poorly its "classic" library is going.  ( 7 min )
    Amazon begins large-scale rollout of palm print-based payments
    The technology has drawn scrutiny from privacy activists and politicians.  ( 5 min )
    Were bones of Waterloo soldiers sold as fertilizer? It’s not yet case closed
    Visitor accounts, artwork describe exact locations of three mass graves  ( 5 min )
    FCC cancels Starlink’s $886 million grant from Ajit Pai’s mismanaged auction
    FCC: "Nascent" Starlink tech has capacity limits, may not deliver required speed.  ( 6 min )
    It’s not just social media: Cable news has bigger effect on polarization
    When it comes to echo chambers, TV trumps online.  ( 7 min )
    Google Fiber was stalled for years but now says it’ll expand to 5 new states
    ISP's history suggests you can expect only limited availability in each area.  ( 6 min )
    LG’s 97-inch vibrating OLED TV claims to offer 5.1 audio without speakers
    LG Display says new OLED panel is brighter and more euphonious than rivals.  ( 5 min )
    Putting together the Webb telescope’s mid-infrared eyes
    The Mid-Infrared Instrument needs to be at 7 Kelvin to work.  ( 6 min )
    Today’s best deals: Google Pixel 6 Pro, Xbox Series S, and more
    Dealmaster also has Wacom tablets, the Apple Pencil, the Surface Pro 8, and the iPad Mini.  ( 9 min )
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    As Black Hat kicks off, the US government is getting the message on hiring security talent
    Katie Moussouris tells it like it is Black Hat  With the world's largest collection of security folk gathering in Las Vegas for Black hat there are encouraging signs that the US government might actually be getting smarter about hiring.…  ( 4 min )
    Facebook hands over chats to cops in post-Roe abortion case
    'If your business model depends on more aggressive surveillance, maybe you need a new business model' Private Facebook chats between a Nebraska mother and her daughter has been used by law enforcement to build a criminal case against the teen for getting a now-illegal abortion in her home state.…  ( 5 min )
    Maui ransomware linked to North Korean group Andariel
    Attack origins point to April 2021 first strike on Japanese target The Maui ransomware that has been used against US healthcare operations has been linked to Andariel, a North Korean state-sponsored threat with links to the notorious Lazarus Group.…  ( 5 min )
    The silicon goldrush is coming, but chip demand is evaporating
    Leave it to the economy to throw another wrench into the semiconductor supply chain In the US, chipmakers and suppliers are scrambling to find a place in line for the more than $52 billion in subsidies and tax breaks up for grabs but that surge in semiconductor demand appears to be faltering.…  ( 6 min )
    Microwaved fish could help scientists create sustainable LEDs
    Supermaterial created from heated scales. Sorry about the smell Scientists in Japan have figured out a new way to create sustainable LEDs: by microwaving fish.…  ( 5 min )
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    Shirish Agarwal: Mum, Samsung Galaxy M-52
    Mum I dunno from where to start. While I’m not supposed to announce it, mum left this earth a month ago (thirteen days when I started to write this blog post) ago. I am still in part denial, part shock, and morose. Of all the seasons in a year, the rainy season used to be my favorite, now would I ever be able to look and feel other than the emptiness that this season has given me? In some senses, it is and was very ironic, when she became ill about last year, I had promised myself I would be by her side for 5-6 years, not go anywhere either Hillhacks or Debconf or any meetup and I was ok with that. Now that she’s no more I have no clue why am I living. What is the purpose, the utility? When she was alive, the utility was understandable. We had an unspoken agreement, I would like after her…  ( 16 min )
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    "CC_OPTIMIZE_FOR_PERFORMANCE_O3" Performance Tunable Dropped In Linux 6.0
    Following recent upstream discussions around the -O3 compiler optimizations for the Linux kernel, the Kconfig switch advertising this option is being removed in Linux 6.0...  ( 4 min )
    Linux 6.0 Adds Raptor Lake P Support To Intel's TCC Cooling Driver
    While last week saw the main set of thermal and power management updates for Linux 6.0, a few more items were sent in this week for the v6.0 merge window...  ( 5 min )
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    Spider-Man Remastered pc-debuterar på fredag, lagom till fredagsgroggen
    Exakt releasetid spikad.  ( 6 min )
    Ny Pokémon-miniserie i september, i och med Pokémon: The Arceus Chronicles
    Fyra avsnitt till Netflix.  ( 6 min )
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    Intel förtydligar prestandamål och lanseringsfönster för Arc "Alchemist"
    I en sammanfattande artikel konstaterar Intel att AMD och Nvidia möter prisvärt motstånd i moderna spel, och att lanseringen kanske inte nödvändigtvis sker i sommar.  ( 6 min )
2022-09-09T04:36:30.001Z osmosfeed 1.15.1